Ashborn
by Lomonaaeren
Summary: SSHPDM, AU. Harry becomes hostage to the Ashborn, led by Snape and risen from the ashes of Voldemort's defeat. In return for a Vow not to start another war, Harry is drawn uneasily into the new world Snape, Malfoy, and the Ashborn are creating.
1. An Exchange of Hostages

**Title: **Ashborn

**Disclaimer: **J. K. Rowling and associates own these characters; I am writing this story for fun and not profit.

**Warnings: **AU starting from the end of HBP (DH never happened). Violence, gore, sex, heavy angst, mind control, people being bastards.

**Pairings: **Snape/Draco, Draco/OFC, and Harry/Ginny; eventual Snape/Harry/Draco.

**Rating: **R

**Summary: **AU. Harry Potter becomes a hostage to the force called the Ashborn, risen from the ashes of Voldemort's Death Eaters, led by Severus Snape. In return for an Unbreakable Vow that Harry won't try to escape, Snape swears a Vow not to start a new war. Unwillingly, uneasily, Harry is caught up in the new life that Snape, Draco, and the Ashborn are creating.

**Author's Notes: **This will most likely be a very long story, unfolding at a leisurely pace and irregularly updated, though I'm going to try to keep to a schedule of once every week (Monday). Chapters will also vary in length. And this is a pretty dark fic as well as threesome fic, so please don't read it if that bothers you.

**Ashborn**

_Chapter One-An Exchange of Hostages_

_This is the way the world ends, _Harry thought.

They were sitting in a tiny, cramped room, on one side of a long wooden table, waiting for the Ashborn representatives to appear. Above, outside, the spring sun shone and the clouds skittered this way and that, tossed by a restless wind.

Not here.

The single candle was the only light that they had. Some of the people gathered behind him had lit their wands, of course, but Harry faced the tunnel that the Ashborn would come marching out of, so he couldn't see them. He preferred to stare at the candle, anyway. It reflected less desperation.

Ron and Hermione stood at his shoulders. Sometimes Hermione touched him; sometimes she wrung her hands. She had cried, earlier, but all the tears were gone now. Ron leaned solidly, strongly, warmly against Harry's back. At the moment, it felt as if he always would.

Not true, of course.

Finally, Harry heard the sound of footfalls. He nodded to Ron and Hermione, and they tensed sympathetically behind him. Harry leaned back further, so that he could get more of their support.

It was unreal to think that, in a short time, he might never be permitted to see them again.

_Then don't think that way, _Harry scolded himself, and kept his gaze as neutral as possible, doing no more than nodding when the Ashborn began to file into the room.

The first of them were large, burly wizards who obviously served as bodyguards. They wore thick grey robes of toughened centaur hide, swirling around them as they took up places on either side of the door and began casting spells. Ron shifted against him in a way that Harry knew meant he was reaching for his wand, but he shook his head and clasped Ron's wrist, hard. The Ashborn had made a promise, or rather their leaders had. Harry didn't think they would change their minds now, when they'd come so far into hostile territory.

_Although knowing some of them..._

But that was the point. Harry didn't know them, anymore, not even the ones who had once been Death Eaters. They had changed. They followed systematic, cold plans that were simply demonstrations of power, destroying property but harming no one. They had done that three times-destroying every building in Hogsmeade; burning the Ministry records without alerting anyone a fire was going; Vanishing an entire wing of Hogwarts-before they had revealed themselves as the organized group they were. It had been meant to impress with power, not pursue some lunatic agenda like the one Voldemort had had.

And Harry didn't know their leader, either, however familiar the name was.

After the initial guards came another rank, tall men and women in robes of a slightly paler grey with black collars that glowed like necklaces of onyx. They didn't carry their wands openly. Given what Harry knew about their abilities in Occlumency and Legilimency, they had no need.

"Shite," Ron hissed.

"What?" Harry followed the motion of his pointing finger to one of them, a woman on the end with heavy dark hair coiled neatly at the nape of her neck. Her eyes watched them with no more feeling than a lizard's. Harry frowned, seeing something almost familiar in the shape of her face.

And he got it, a moment later. This was Bellatrix Lestrange. Bellatrix Lestrange _sane._

"Shite," he said back, and swallowed. Ron was practically draped over him, now, but none of the Ashborn already in the room made any comment on it. The man who came through the door in the next instant did.

"Unable to stand on your own without your pet Weasel, Potter?"

Harry nodded grimly. This was one of the men he had expected, who had revealed their names and their faces shortly after the Ashborn's three attacks. One of the two who had fled on the night the war proper started and whom Harry had thought dead or out of England long since.

"Malfoy," he said. "As you can see, I'm sitting. Try to be more observant next time."

* * *

It had been a long, long time-almost three years-since Draco had felt a spark of the incandescent fury that Potter had once been able to light in him. For a moment, he held still and savored it, fanning the flames with a few light thoughts as they traveled through his chest.

Then he dismissed them with a chuckle and sat down in one of the two chairs across from Potter. "You're right," he said. "I will try."

Potter glared at him. He was always glaring, Draco thought, or grinning. His face seemed made for nothing else. He was taller than he had been, though he would never be as tall as Draco, and his hair curled so savagely around a pale face that Draco wouldn't have been surprised if he ran through woods to get here. The green eyes were a hawk's. Draco told himself to remember that. Potter had ceased being prey during the long hunt after Voldemort's Horcruxes.

That was all right. Draco had been a hunter for longer than he had. And he had a fellow hunter who protected him and stood behind him in a way that none of Potter's friends could, simply because they were lesser than he was. Severus would never be lesser than Draco.

"Where's Snape?" Potter asked, and his voice was guttural. He shifted uneasily in his seat. "I thought he was supposed to be here."

"Oh, he will be here," Draco said, mentally sneering at Potter for being unable to sit through one minute of waiting. But because he didn't want to start a fight yet-if everything went right, then Potter would be with them for a very long time-he kept the sneer mental only. "He had to stop and speak to several of the Ashborn who don't like him entering a concealed and contained space like this."

Potter frowned and looked at the guards, but said nothing. Perhaps he had learned to keep _some _of the drivel inside his mouth. Draco approved.

The shadows moved at the mouth of the tunnel, but Draco didn't need that to sense Severus's approach. He had already turned to face him thanks to the soft chime around his throat.

Severus swept into the room the way he had once swept into the Potions classroom. Alone of the wizards in the room, he wore unrelieved black, without an ash-grey band on the collar. He carried his wand openly in his hand, but laid it on the table between him and Potter before sitting.

Weasley stared at the wand as if he wanted to seize it. Potter clasped his hands and stared at Severus with a deep, bleak attention that he hadn't given Draco. Draco considered whether he should be insulted, and then shook his head. Severus was the leader, after all.

"Potter." Severus spoke with a slower, deeper tone than any he had used when Potter and his Weasels knew him, and Draco saw Potter sit up, his eyes alight. "You have come prepared to do as I asked?"

Before Potter could answer, Weasley leaned down to him and hissed in his ear, "Don't do it, Harry!"

"We can find some other way," Granger said. She stood so still that Draco could have overlooked her, but the hair put paid to any chance he would do that. She had the gleam of tears on one cheek. "We can fight them."

Severus smiled. Draco leaned nearer to him, and waited.

"No, we can't," Potter snapped, reaching out as if he wanted to press both Weasley and Granger flat to the table and make them shut up. But he only rested his hands on his friends' heads and gazed soulfully into their eyes. "You know as well as I do that we have no choice about this. I'm not going to plunge the wizarding world into another war just because I want my freedom. You can't choose me over everyone else," he added, staring hard at Granger as she opened her mouth. "I won't let you. This is a small price compared to what they _could_ be asking."

This time, Severus shared the smile with Draco. Draco nodded back. _That's five Galleons I owe him. Potter has matured a bit, it seems._

"Harry, I wish," Granger said, and then bowed her head and said nothing.

"What if they torture you, mate?" Weasley asked with a shrill note in his voice. "You can't tell me that you would prefer years of being tortured and healed again to a war that you already know how to fight!" He swing to face Draco, his hand openly on his wand. The Ashborn guards swayed forwards one pace, all at once.

Severus held up his hand. The guards swayed back to the wall again.

"I see no need for this," Severus said, his voice dropping lower still. "Potter will live. I no longer bear the grudges of the past."

_I have no intention of making him a martyr that his friends and the useless Ministry can then drum up fire and war to avenge, _he had told Draco in the silence of their private chamber before they came here. Draco had nodded so that Severus could feel his chin cutting into his shoulder, and then bent down and given Severus other things to think about.

Potter, now, just chopped his head and his hand down both at once. Weasley jumped and put his wand away as if from a scolding. He whispered one more word to Potter, but whatever it was just made Potter turn in his seat to embrace him, instead of rebelling against fate. Draco closed his eyes so that he wouldn't have to watch.

Severus had the paper-thin sort of smile again. He tapped his wand when Potter and Weasley were done with their hug and said, "I assume that you have chosen a Bonder, Potter?"

"Hermione." Potter pulled out his own wand and held it towards Severus. His gaze remained direct, and although he still touched his best friends, he no longer looked at them. "And you'll take the Vow first."

"As I agreed," Severus said, only a faint blink of his eyes showing how bored he was. "Very well. Consider the wording of these vows carefully."

"I already did," said Potter, nudging Draco's estimation of his intelligence up to two out of ten. "First, you'll promise to launch no physical, magical, spiritual, or potions-driven attack on the wizarding world as long as they leave the Ashborn alone, and that goes for all the Ashborn."

"I agree," Severus said at once.

Potter drew back, wrongfooted.

Draco smirked into his hand. Potter did not understand that the Ashborn moved like a single body, of which Severus was the mind.

"Er, right," Potter said. He glanced once at Granger, then leaned forwards. "Second, you swear not to instigate any of those kind of attacks on anyone else."

"Agreed," Severus responded. His lip curled briefly; then he smoothed out his face again. Draco pushed his hand into Severus's arm beneath the table, and felt Severus's hand turn up to clasp his.

"Third, if you come up with another method of attack not covered by these terms, you also swear not to use it against anyone as long as they leave the Ashborn alone."

Draco raised an eyebrow. _Very well, three out of ten._

"Agreed," Severus said. He looked at Potter, who stared searchingly back at him, as if looking for the reason that Severus would want to be leader of the Ashborn in the first place, before reaching out and taking his hand. Granger picked up her wand, prepared to serve as Bonder.

* * *

Potter's hand was clammy, and callused. They were calluses that came from the grip of a wand, Severus thought. He did not remember Potter having them in Hogwarts. He also would not have thought that Potter would have wielded his wand often enough to acquire them in the past few years.

_Do not judge by appearances, _he told himself, an old lesson that he absorbed a bit more of each time it was reiterated, and locked his eyes on Potter's face. Potter immediately looked a little aside and began to recite the vows again in a mechanical voice, while fire twined from Granger's wand about their hands.

Severus let his fingers flex, testing the boy's grip. Potter didn't react. Severus added the information to his slender store of facts about the new Potter.

When the vows had finished, Potter looked at him without releasing his hand and said, "So. What did you want from me?"

_For these fools to obey you, _Severus thought, but he knew that he couldn't count on that. It was the reason for the clause in his own vows that said he was free to attack if some of these idiots attacked him. "First, you will agree that you will make no attempt to harm any of the Ashborn," he said, "by potions, magic, or any other method."

"Am I allowed self-defense?" Potter had acquired the ability to look at Severus without blinking, which Severus found disconcerting. But it was a third fact, and he placed it with the others.

"Unless they attack you, of course," Severus said.

A brief tremor ran through Potter's hand at that, but his nod and his words were both clipped. "Fine."

Severus waited a moment. The room grew smoky with tension. Weasley strained against the tether of Potter's will, one hand trembling on his wand. Granger didn't move. Potter waited.

Severus said, "Second, you will agree not to attempt escape by any physical or magical method."

A faint smile on Potter's face. "Yes," he said.

"Third," Severus continued, "you will not instigate a rebellion by any means, magical, physical, or otherwise, among the Ashborn or among your own people." The clause relating to the Ashborn was unnecessary in reality, but needed in theory, and it simply caused Potter to nod again.

Severus paused one more time, revising the vows in his head. He had thought them over carefully when he made them, and discussed them with his inner circle of advisers and with Draco, but there was no reason to assume that they were perfect. In Severus's view, imperfections in important things came from confidence rather than doubt.

But he could think of nothing else that he would care if Potter did. He might take up chess, or spend the rest of his life flying about on his broom. He was important not for the flesh-and-blood body that his spirit traveled in, but for what he meant to others. Caged away, the suffering, noble martyr for his people, he would inspire a brief passel of romantic dreams, and nothing more dangerous.

"Very well," he said, and once more Granger acted as their Bonder, this time with her audible sobbing as background. Potter shifted so that his right side was nearer to her, Severus noticed. He did not touch her or speak, but repeated his own vows in a voice like hammer blows. He winced as they finished, though. Severus knew why. Unless one had undertaken an Unbreakable Vow before, the sudden weight of an iron collar on the shoulders and neck was always shocking.

"Ready?" Draco was on his feet already, hovering and glancing back and forth between them. Severus raised a single brow, and Draco flushed and plopped back into his chair.

"Yes," Potter said. He rose to his feet and turned back to his friends, vanishing behind a skillfully cast wall of silence. Severus rose to his feet and carefully tested the bonds of the new Vow. He thought they would become tolerable, in time.

After all, this was the only time he had ever made the Vow of his own free will.

* * *

"Harry, please, Harry, you can't," Hermione said, over and over again, her words like rainwater on stone. Harry bowed his head until his hair touched her throat, and said nothing. He had said it all already.

"He left a gap," Ron whispered. "The one he said you would. You can still _communicate _with us, Harry."

"He doesn't care about that as long as I don't use it to struggle against him," Harry said. "And I'm not going to. The Vow would kill me. And I do still want to live."

_Is that wrong? _he wondered. _Should I want to fall nobly and die while I still can, fighting for the wizarding world's freedom?_

But he had come too far for that. The arguments with his friends had all been fought; the desperate ideas and wild plans for alternatives had been come up with, then crushed by knowledge of what the Ashborn really were. Harry knew, if they didn't, that he had won the war against Voldemort by luck and by love. Neither method would work here. Snape had no Horcruxes.

_I can be a sacrifice, but not sacrificed, _he thought, and squeezed Ron's arm. "You'll hear from me again," he promised, since Ron looked almost ready to cry. "And maybe he'll permit visits in a while."

"They," Hermione said unexpectedly.

Harry turned to her, blinking. "What?"

"They." Hermione had been watching the Ashborn, Harry realized, while he and Ron were talking, and she turned back to them now with a cool light in her eyes. "Snape's the leader, but I think Malfoy is important, too. You can see it in the way that he leans close to Snape and touches him."

Harry felt a blast of purely strategic frustration. How was he going to survive and make decisions about what should come next in the war without Hermione beside him? He wasn't as good as she was at reading people.

And then he caught himself, and shook his head with a wry smile. He ought to have remembered. His days of war and leadership were both over. He might have some need for her skills in prison, but he would just have to hone them on his own, and he would use them for different purposes.

"I'll remember, and try not to offend him," he said, gripping Hermione's arm hard. "Keep yourself safe."

Hermione nodded, eyes enormous and sad, and then sank down on the chair that had been his before. Harry leaned in and kissed her cheek, then turned and gripped Ron's hand. His face was the color of Ashborn robes.

"Take-take care of yourself, mate," he choked out. Harry pounded him twice on the back and then stepped towards Snape and Malfoy. If they stayed here much longer, he knew that Ron would try to fight, and that wasn't something he could risk.

"All right," he told Snape and Malfoy. "I'm ready." He reached down and tapped his pocket, making sure that he still had his wand and his shrunken trunk of possessions: his Invisibility Cloak, his picture album, his broomstick, and Hedwig's cage, along with some unimportant clothes. Hedwig herself circled over this underground shelter that had belonged to the Order of the Phoenix, awaiting the moment when he went to the prison.

"You have nothing else to take with you?" Malfoy scanned him from head to foot, tilting to one side.

"No," Harry answered, and walked towards them, assuming they would leave by the tunnel they had come in by.

The Ashborn guards stirred, and Bellatrix raised her wand. Harry halted and looked at them. "Didn't they hear me swear a Vow not to harm them?" he asked Snape. "I would have thought their ears weren't decorations."

Snape's nostrils flared. "They serve me," he said in a voice pounded flat of all emotion. "They grow-nervous-when someone comes near enough to me. You will do best to wait until we are both in the tunnel and a detachment of guards has gone before and after us."

"All right," Harry said, and stood there, waiting.

Malfoy gave him a look of quick wonder before he ducked after Snape. Harry didn't waste a shrug on him, but he wanted to. What, had Malfoy thought he would fight this, kicking and screaming about how unfair it was? Harry never would have agreed to this in the first place if he would only do that. He knew Snape and Malfoy could probably maneuver his friends into attacking the Ashborn and then retaliate against them.

As Snape had said, most of the guards passed into the tunnel after him, and then the one on the end beckoned Harry forwards. Harry stepped into the tunnel, smelling damp, mold, earth. Behind him, a wand planted itself in the middle of his back and never wavered all the time they marched. He knew it would be Bellatrix.

Ron and Hermione were both crying now, from the sound. Harry didn't look back, because he didn't fancy staring into Bellatrix's eyes.

_I'm giving you the chance, _he thought to his friends. _That someone else can think up a way to free our world from the Ashborn, that someone else can do what I failed to do. I've had one war where I was the hero. Now it's time for me to play a different role._

* * *

Draco could hardly believe that Potter was real.

He answered like one of the automatons that Severus had created to serve him in his lab. He walked down the tunnel without looking behind him. He had a farewell with his friends that was only tearful on one side. He didn't drag half the world in possessions behind him, not even a Gryffindor scarf looped around his neck.

Draco conjured a mirror in his palm and used it to watch Potter as they walked. Potter never altered his stride or a muscle in his face. He looked as if he were captive already, in a section of his mind.

Draco Vanished the mirror with a flick of his wand when he saw Severus looking at him. Severus twitched his head towards Potter, and Draco nodded. Severus simply looked away.

Draco understood. Potter was a necessary condition of this treaty; free, he could cause too much trouble. Severus didn't care about him other than that.

But Severus wanted to establish a world where he would never have to do anything but brew again, where the Ashborn would run themselves. Draco knew that, and admired it as a worthy goal. It didn't mean that he wanted to wake up one day and find themselves among the smoldering ruins of that world, as was all too likely to happen where Potter was involved.

Draco would keep an eye on Potter.

* * *

Severus felt the walls drop away from him as he stepped back into his lab. His house was a large one, attached to Ash House-it would be stupid for it not to be-but solely with a narrow tunnel of wizardspace. Only a few guards remained with him, and none inside the doors.

Severus had shown them the tested wards. They accepted that he would be safe here.

He turned. Bellatrix still hovered behind, mind trembling through her Mark like a dog on a leash. Severus brushed his hand over his own quiescent Dark Mark and felt her settle into a more languid mental posture.

"You will not hurt Potter," he told her. "You will see that he has food, clothing, and all the other things he needs to live here. And you will leave me alone for five hours until dinner. Knock three times, pause, and knock twice again."

"My lord," Bellatrix said, and went away. The channel between him and her swirled with cold grey clouds, but no more than that. Severus nodded to her retreating back and shut the door. Other than brewing a few potions that he had sent into the wider world, where they had made his reputation and his Galleons, breaking her to heel was the achievement he was proudest of in the last few years.

He laid his hands on the cauldron he had started that morning, before they left for the meeting with Potter, and shut his eyes. The cold metal warmed under his touch, gradually, for a count of two hundred heartbeats. Severus finished the count, removed the spell he had cast on the cauldron that had frozen the arc of the potion inside in mid-leap, and moved aside as it nearly splashed his face.

A pinch of salt was the next ingredient. Severus cast it in and watched as it sifted down into the surface of the potion. The next leap was cut short, and a dark splotch like a sunburst formed beneath the last drifting grain. Severus cast in three leaves of rosemary next, and time seemed to shiver and stop as the dark splotch swallowed them whole.

If this worked...

Silver spread across the black patch, rendering it gleaming and pearly. Severus half-bowed his head in homage to his own talent and resumed with bayleaf, unicorn fur, phoenix feather, and fairy dust.

The potion sang around him, the ingredients coming readily to hand, his fingers moving like dancers, his mind clicking from step to step. This was the only thing that was real.

And it was the only time that he was.

* * *

Harry looked around the rooms he had been told were his, and nodded. They were low enough, the ceilings only a foot above his head, the walls made of plain and bare black stone. A fireplace along the left wall would keep it warm. The large bed in the center meant he would have to edge around the foot, but at least it was covered with thick green sheets that were likely to be warm, too. Next to the bed was a table, a chair, and a trunk where he could keep his possessions. The door at the side, made of paneled oak set with silver, led to a bathroom, or so Malfoy said.

"What are you laughing at?" Malfoy's voice stung.

Harry shook his head. Malfoy probably thought silver on a bathroom door was appropriate. Harry had to wonder if he'd find a golden loo inside. "Nothing," he said, and set his shrunken trunk down on the bed, along with his wand. Malfoy watched him as if he had a poison sac attached to the holly wand. _If only. _But that probably fell under either magical or physical attacks. "I presume that I'll be fed a meal in my room for the first night?"

Malfoy stared at him some more, and Harry considered him. Taller, yes, with a more pointed face, yes, and skin that practically shone in the faint light around them, yes. Harry didn't know how the light was produced, and suspected that no one would tell him. Malfoy had hair that shone, too. Harry wondered if he applied glamour charms to himself, started to shrug off the thought as useless, and then kept it. He suspected he'd think about trivialities like that a lot here, where there was so little else to do.

"Yes," Malfoy said at last, sounding as if his mouth was stuffed with cloth. "Bella has the assignment to provide you with food."

Harry nodded. "All right."

Malfoy leaned one shoulder against the doorway. "It doesn't bother you anymore that she killed your godfather?"

"I have to get along with people here for the rest of my life," Harry said. "Complaining about something as small as that isn't the way to do it."

If anything, Malfoy looked more offended by honesty than he had been by Harry refusing to tell him what he had been thinking, or by questions. He leaned nearer and hissed, "If you think that you can break free and lead the great revolt that will free your friends from the Ashborn, Potter, you should _definitely _think again."

Harry snorted. "I know. All of them are loyal to Snape, they would never be loyal to me, and I would need loyalists around me if I was going to do something as insane as challenging people who hold an Unbreakable Vow over my head."

Malfoy loomed closer. Harry felt his body tighten and then loosen, and he saw the several ways that he could spring at Malfoy and knock him off-balance in an instant, bearing him to the floor and choking him. Harry exhaled hard in irritation and then held still, weathering the battle-senses that beat inside him like hawks in a cage. The only good thing about being a hostage with a Vow that made it impossible for him to lift a hand against anyone except in self-defense, he thought, was that he wouldn't be able to indulge these reactions. Perhaps they would go away on their own after a time. Perhaps he would cease to start awake at every little sound, and to have nightmares because of a single intense stare, and to notice all the ways that he could escape a room when he walked into it.

Perhaps. Harry wasn't holding out much faith in that transformation.

"You could be a bit more humble," Malfoy said. "That wouldn't go at all amiss."

"I'll keep that in mind." Harry yawned. The weight of the day pressed down on him, and the sheets on the bed looked comfortable enough, if not made of silk. He kicked off his boots and turned to burrow under them.

"I'm standing right in the room with you, Potter!" Malfoy's voice had risen a note towards what Harry thought of as its natural falsetto.

"Don't worry," Harry muttered, already plumping his head on the pillow and closing his eyes. "I won't take off my clothes in front of you and violate your chastity."

Malfoy shut the door hard enough that Harry heard something break. He snorted into the pillow that cushioned his nose and shook his head.

He had endured a childhood of shutting up with the Dursleys, he had reasoned with himself before he agreed to become a hostage. He had hoped that he'd escaped it forever when he went to Hogwarts, but obviously that wasn't true, and he shouldn't have hoped it was in the first place. Hope made you weak, gave you vulnerable places that someone else could try to assault, and led to impossible visions like fighting the Ashborn. Maybe someone would come up with a way, but he was committed, now, and couldn't.

He could endure this. At least he had the promise of regular meals.

And then snorting became snoring, and he ceased to think at all of Ashborn and Vows for a while.

* * *

Draco paced back and forth in his meditation rooms, tempted to kick at the expensive mahogany and ebony furniture. But Severus regularly came into these rooms, and he would stare at such damage. Draco was still trying to prove, at least to himself and the flat stares of the Ashborn, that he was above such emotions, and so he sat down in the nearest chair and tried to concentrate on touching the silk that covered the arms instead.

Potter irritated him _effortlessly._

It was that which stirred Draco so. If Potter had shown that he was sweating to think of his insults, if he had fretted and fumed at being caged the way Draco had expected a proud Gryffindor to do, if he had acted like a wild beast or just a Weasley, then Draco would have felt secure in his victory over him.

Instead, Potter nodded a bit and went to sleep in his rooms as though he had expected no better than this.

If Draco had been a leader and a power in the wizarding world and then someone had told him that he had to serve out the rest of his life as a hostage because his "supporters" were too cowardly to figure out an alternative method of coping with the threat, he would have damned them all, said something suitably cutting to be repeated down the generations, and fled with as much money as he could carry. He had accepted, assumed, without thinking, that Potter would be the same.

_Severus does say that assumptions will be the death of you._

Now, with the fact that he had failed to anticipate Potter staring him in the face, Draco let his breath out slowly and shook his head. He didn't understand what had happened, but he wouldn't let that fact deter him from trying to understand Potter. He would pick up the shattered pieces and try again from a new angle, and in time he _would _understand and pin Potter's squirming essence down like a butterfly on a pin.

He was the power among the Ashborn. He understood life here. He wielded several of the guards, whom Severus had assigned to him, like dogs on chains, and he aspired no higher, since the only one who stood above him was Severus, and he knew no one else would treat him half so indulgently.

When he was sure that the fit of temper had passed and resolve taken its place, Draco stood and walked across the room to his major bookshelf, pulling out a scroll in Ancient Runes that he had begun to translate. Its title was _Our Customs, Our Culture, Our Future, _and it was by an ancestor of his from the maternal line, Argellus Black.

Draco sighed as he opened the book. At some point, someone had dropped it in what might well be a river, and no one had bothered to clean up the runny mess that that turned the runes into. That made his task harder than it already was, given the shaky lines of some of the runes and their abstruse subject matter.

But he wanted to, and in the Ashborn, no one asked him about wasting time unless his orders conflicted with Severus's. Draco sat down on his bed, reached for the writing lap-desk and pieces of parchment that he was already using, and began to work, now and then reaching for a book on interpreting Ancient Runes that he kept always ready to hand.

* * *

Severus sat down to dinner with a nod in the direction of the guards who had escorted him and the servers who brought the food out. That was important, he had learned, to keep a small but continuous network of praise moving through his people. It increased their conviction that he valued them and in turn made them more likely to do good work and to get along with the people around them.

It was, of course, possible that Severus was getting less good work than he thought out of them, or missing undercurrents that he would have to smooth out if he wanted to lead a completely undisturbed life. But that was what his absolutely loyal Ashborn, the ones who had once borne the Dark Mark, were for. They would notice discontent before he did and bring it to him.

Dinner that night was a roast in thick gravy, which Severus tasted before the rest of the table got to. The others dining with him were his inner circle of Marked pure-bloods, who thought themselves rulers because they did not lift their wands in menial tasks, and a Ministry representative who looked as if he would faint every time someone coughed. Draco came in late, the scrubbed remains of ink on his fingers and an abstracted expression on his face.

"You have had a productive evening?" Severus asked as Draco settled into the chair beside his. For a moment, Draco started, and then he resumed the calm demeanor and focused look that Severus expected of him. He nodded, spreading his napkin over his lap with a graceful economy of motion.

"I did. I translated six more pages of Black's book." Draco paused to taste the dry white wine that the servers offered him and then continued, in a lower voice, although nothing he said at the moment was not common knowledge among the Ashborn. "Severus, the more I learn, the more work I can see it's going to take. We know almost _nothing _about our heritage anymore. We've let it all lapse, the Mudbloods have-well, muddied everything. If we want to raise children in a real, true pure-blood culture, then we've got to teach people what they're missing, and we have to show them the glories of the past in a way that will interest them."

Severus nodded and listened, the way that Draco would listen to him speak of potions. In truth, he cared little for the pure-blood world and culture that Draco mourned, dreamed of, and breathed. He had turned to manipulating the Death Eaters after the Dark Lord's death because they were the group that had accepted him, and the one that he did not live in the shadows among. If they had been Muggleborns, then Severus would have manipulated them just as easily.

But most of the Muggleborns in the wizarding world were solidly behind Dumbledore and then behind Potter. Severus saw no reason to try his hand with people mostly won over and held by charismatic leadership, rather than sheer power. The pure-bloods understood more of the reality of things, especially once Severus altered their Marks.

"I don't understand Potter."

Severus realized that Draco, with typical Draco impatience, had moved on from the subject he could spill endless floods on and had reached the one where he had a dam and wanted contributions to the stream. Severus ate a bite and found one. "Did you expect to?"

"I didn't expect him to have _changed_," Draco said briefly. "You told me once that Gryffindors never do that."

Severus looked at his younger lover, and admired the shine in Draco's eyes before he said, "I can think of little that is more Gryffindor than offering oneself up as a sacrifice, against the protests of one's followers and among the tears of friends."

Draco shook his head. "But he's-_tame_. He lay down on his bed and went to sleep as if it were no trouble at all! He acted as though he didn't care that he would have to spend the rest of his days a prisoner!"

Draco was causing several of the inner circle to give them glances, and the Ministry ambassador to lean back in his chair. Severus touched his jaw in warning. Draco followed his gaze and then swallowed, leaning back as though his muscles had gone languid. Bitter embers still burned in his eyes.

"I don't understand him," he repeated. "And I want to."

He might as well not have added that last bit; Severus recognized the desire in him. Since the end of the war, or rather their part in it, Draco had always wanted to understand everything, as though knowledge could prevent what had happened to his parents. It would, at least, make him feel less helpless, and Severus could recognize the value in that.

But he had never used Draco's tactic in cases where he wanted to know more: asking constant questions, offering random guesses and seeing what his target did in response to them, or making himself annoying until keeping secrets lost its pleasure. Severus would watch for himself, see the knowledge, and secure it. Draco's way simply resulted in more unpleasantness than it was worth.

"You need not understand Potter," Severus said. "He has nothing to do with the goals of the Ashborn."

"He might," Draco said. "What if you decide to use him?"

Severus laughed. He could see all his guards orient on the sound in an instant, but ignored them. The Ministry ambassador's reaction was more interesting, and noted for later reference. "Potter's one use would be in spearheading a revolution," he said. "And I am not interested in using him for such a purpose. We have our revolution, and it is better to brew it in the privacy of our domain than spread outside it."

"Except when we meet someone we think is susceptible to conversion," Draco murmured.

Severus knew the witch he was thinking of, and nodded. "If you think her a viable candidate, speak to her."

Draco's astonished gaze was gratifying. Severus stood and held out a hand to him. Draco accepted it, and under the wide eyes of the Ministry ambassador, they took their way to Severus's rooms.

He pinned Draco against the door once he had him inside and pressed his lips down on his, pressing more and more firmly until Draco gave in with a mingled choke and sigh of surrender, spreading his arms wide.

Brewing was not Severus's _only_ interest. Draco's questions had had at least that lasting effect.

* * *

"Food, Potter."

Harry would never have thought he'd notice, but Bellatrix Lestrange's voice seemed oddly flat and deadened without her madness. She simply held out the tray to him, eyes like a snake's, and watched as Harry ate his way steadily through the roast and the small selection of vegetables offered. When Harry looked about for something to drink, she handed him a wooden goblet filled with water, which she left behind on the table next to his bed when she took the tray away.

Harry sat up when she had left and looked about thoughtfully. The food wasn't drugged, he thought, looking at the walls, or they would have blurred and wavered in his vision. The sheets didn't scratch beneath him, or feel as if they would suddenly extend hundreds of little needles and pierce him to death, as he'd once had a nightmare about during the war. The walls didn't sound hollow when he knocked on them, promising no exciting secret passages.

Well, he might as well try as soon as he could-and while he was awake and untortured-to communicate with Ron and Hermione. They would be worried, although by Harry's estimation he hadn't been away from them more than a few hours, and it would be a good test of the loophole that Harry thought Snape had left on purpose.

He opened his door and checked just to be sure no guard was there, then went close to a wall, thought of a snake, and asked in Parseltongue, "_Is anyone here_?"

Silence for so long that Harry thought his gamble had failed. Then a scratchy voice answered, "_I smell food._"

Harry smiled and stepped across to the table and the small scraps of meat he had concealed there. As closely as Bellatrix had watched him, he had been cleverer; he'd had years of eating from the Dursleys' table only what he could slip into his hand. He picked them up, spelled off the gravy, and carried them back over to the wall. "_Yours, if you will do a small service for me." _The word "service" came out something like "food-bargain," which Harry actually preferred to some other things it could have been. As long as he could feed a snake, he thought he could persuade it to carry messages for him.

The slender nose of a bright green serpent extended from the crack in the wall. Harry didn't know the species, but he didn't think it was native to Britain. Probably something brought over in a shipment of exotic Potions ingredients, or come to eat those exotic ingredients. When it crawled out onto his arm and extended a tongue to touch the scraps, Harry saw it was a viper.

He still wasn't worried, although he became a bit more alert. He thought he could hit the snake with a spell before it bit him.

"_What is the service?"_ The snake edged closer to the food, but Harry closed his fingers warningly around it and waited until the bright, flat eyes swung reluctantly back to him. He had been wrong, Harry thought. They had more life than Bellatrix's.

"_Carry a small thing I will give you to a place I will give you._"

The snake considered that, tongue darting again and again at Harry's closed hand. "_I do not know the wide-place," _it said finally. "_I have seen the stone-place. I do not know the directions for food or hiding._"

"_I will use power to bring you to a particular place in the wide-place," _Harry promised.

"_What power?"_

_ "The same power that lets me speak to you._"

"_Then I agree."_

Harry opened his hand and let the snake feed on the scraps, then went over and took out the letter he had written already, before he even got here, from his trunk. It said such vague things as he had thought they would want to hear: that he was being treated well, that Snape was keeping his word, and that the place they had given him was bearable. Harry had been sure that would be true no matter what happened. Anything was bearable, next to the Dursleys.

Hatred he had weathered, he thought, as he shrank the paper and then folded it, hopefully to a size that wouldn't make it simply slip down the viper's throat. Indifference was almost a gift next to it.

When the viper had taken the paper in its mouth and Harry had Apparated it away, he lay back down on the bed. He would need a diversion other than sleeping soon, he thought, because he would get bored, but for now, he just wanted to try and catch up on the rest he had missed during the war. He closed his eyes and let darkness sweep over him.

_Something that's probably going to become very familiar, with the Ashborn._


	2. Loquor Animalibus

Thank you for all the reviews!

_Chapter Two-Loquor Animalibus_

"Bring me the rosemary." Severus held out his hand without looking, and not simply because the flat green surface of the potion could not be left unwatched at the moment. This was as much a test of the newest automaton he had created as it was of his brewing skills.

Silence, and then a slither and a click, a slither and a click, and an ending clack. The pinch of rosemary ended up in his hand, and Severus turned it over and watched the herb land in the potion. An expanding circle of red disturbed the green where it fell. Severus gave a hard smile. The theory that the Potions master Samuel Kibbley had propounded, that rosemary was not a powerful enough magical substance to alter an acid-based potion, was thus disproven.

"Well done," Severus said, a shared compliment, and turned around to consider his automaton.

It resembled a hound, if hounds walked on their hind feet and were made entirely of gleaming metal. Severus had chosen silver for this one's beginning and then tarnished it, so that it would not reflect too much in its sides and dazzle or distract him during sensitive creations. He had retained two glowing red gems for eyes, but exiled the floppy ears that he had begun with and made the jaws longer and narrower, with picks for teeth. The forepaws extended upright and flat in front of it, to serve as holding trays, and the tail, the source of the slithering noise, ended in another.

Severus decided, as he usually did now, that the automaton's design could not be improved, and nodded. "Fetch me ink and parchment," he said, and the hound made its way to the far side of the room. It could move faster, Severus thought, but he would have to redesign it completely for that.

Or, better, begin anew with another. By the time that the hound returned with ink and parchment, Severus had already started to envision a snake-shaped one, and he passed most of the morning hours in drawing.

* * *

"Exercise, Potter."

Bellatrix Lestrange had woken him that morning with the blank declaration. Harry had stood up and prepared to go outside because it was easier than arguing about it. He'd chosen a fairly heavy shirt and trousers, but if it turned out to be warmer than he thought it was, he could always alter them. He'd got good at quick, rough Transfigurations of that kind during the years that he fought the war.

The "exercise room," as Bellatrix insisted on calling it even though it was outside, was a simple courtyard of bare grass enclosed by grey stone walls as blank as her voice. Harry walked in circles around it a few times, watching her over his shoulder, expecting her to call him in at any moment. But Bellatrix just stood where she'd planted herself, by the door to the Ashborn complex, and stared at him. Harry shrugged a little. He reckoned she'd been told to allow him some more time. She wasn't imaginative enough to come up with all these suggestions by herself.

In fact, he thought as he bent down and began to do some stretches, none of the Ashborn seemed at all imaginative. Their eyes, their faces, the way they moved, the way they focused on Snape (and maybe Malfoy) to the exclusion of all else, their absolutely identical clothing...they weren't encouraged to have much in the way of individual personality. That could be a weakness. If they needed Snape to command them, then what would happen when he wasn't around, or occupied with something else? Harry thought that Snape would be smart enough to set up a command hierarchy in that case, probably stemming from Malfoy, but there must also be times that _Malfoy _was busy or distracted, and then who else could take over?

He recognized the direction his thoughts were taking and stopped himself with a wry smile. He had promised not to foment rebellion. He didn't think the Vow would take action unless he decided to _do _something. Still. Not a good habit to get into.

He lay on his back and made cycling motions with his legs up in the air, purely for the sake of something to do.

Something to do. Yes. That was the problem. He had promised to be a good little hostage, but he couldn't live on letters from his friends and the occasional chances to annoy Malfoy, who would probably keep out of his way most of the time. He needed an activity that would occupy him, either his brain and his hands or simply his hands, while leaving him time to dream.

Huh.

_What, then? _

Harry rolled back to one knee, and that was when he spotted the bird watching him. It perched on the wall above his head, a white raven with brilliant black eyes. When it saw him looking back, it bobbed its head in what might have been a greeting and stalked a bit closer along the wall.

From the corner of his eye, Harry saw Bellatrix lifting her wand. The bird seemed to know the motion well. It spread its wings and sprang into the air with a mocking caw before soaring out of sight.

"What was that?" Harry asked. She hadn't shown an inclination to answer questions from him so far, but then again, he hadn't really tried to ask her any.

Bellatrix turned her head and stared as if she had forgotten his presence. Then she grunted and seemed to decide that Harry speaking didn't violate any of her orders. "The sign of an enemy," she said.

"An Animagus?" Harry looked with more interest in the direction where the raven had disappeared. Speaking to someone outside the Ashborn and their strict, joyless routine sounded good right now.

"Not human, not from a human," Bellatrix said shortly, and gestured. "Food."

_I think I liked her better when she was mad and babbling, _Harry decided as he followed her. _And anyway, what did she mean? That bird was too intelligent to be anything but an Animagus, someone's familiar, or a messenger bird like an owl. _

Only when he was eating his breakfast-toast, fresh fruit, scones, milk-did he realize what else Bellatrix's words might have meant.

_Not human, not from a human. But an enemy._

_ It could have come from a delegation of magical creatures._

* * *

Draco leaned back in his chair and closed his eyes. The meditation rooms were supposed to be conducive to clear thoughts, and that might even have been the case if he could think about anything but the way that he and Severus had tumbled across the bed last night, before Severus pinned him down and began to lick his-

Draco pulled himself from the memory. Whether or not he needed to have a clear mind to accomplish anything worthwhile, as Severus often insisted, was an unresolved philosophical question; what was _true _was that he shouldn't be thinking of what his lord and lover had done to him while trying to write a letter to the woman he hoped would agree to bear his child.

He opened his eyes and stared at the blank ream of white parchment in front of him. He tried to think of it as filled with brilliant light, the light of opportunity, instead of the threatening, well, blankness that it seemed to have sometimes.

Then he sighed and picked up the quill. No matter how long he considered, he had a feeling that he wouldn't come up with anything better than what he'd already thought of.

_My Lady Jocelyn,_

_ I am sure that you will find an application from someone outside the circle of your family strange. I have learned that you are part of a tradition that follows the older ways, the culture that most of the pure-bloods-including my family-abandoned because it was too hard to keep up and we wanted more power and influence. Under normal circumstances, you would expect to marry one of your illustrious, distant cousins and continue the traditions within the safe circle of the community._

_ I am not asking you for traditional fidelis marriage. I am asking you for a filius marriage._

_As for my qualifications, I have one of the oldest pure-blood ancestries in England, and I am the second-in-command of Severus Snape, who controls the Ashborn. Any child you bore for me would have a secure environment to grow up in, and the protection of guards who literally could not betray him. I would make sure that he knew of both sides of his heritage and had a choice in the form of his name, as long as Malfoy remained in it. He might visit your family whenever he wished to, you wished to, and safe transport could be arranged. He would never be exposed to Muggles or Mudbloods except at his own choice._

_ For your inconvenience during the nine months of pregnancy and the birth, I am prepared to pay a tenth of the Galleons in the Malfoy vaults. Or you may have your choice of bloodline artifacts. _

_ I am currently involved in the effort to learn the ways that we have abandoned over the years. There are certain taints that cannot be scrubbed away, certain movements that cannot be undone. For example, many of the Ashborn have Squib ancestors, and many of our ancient documents have been destroyed, lost, or left locked up in the languages and runes we no longer speak. But as we recover them, we will create a new culture, and my son would be the recipient of a tradition vital for its newness. This new culture will not be lost to Muggles, or given up for temporary short-term advantages. Our children will be reared in it. The Ashborn will cooperate together as teachers, as foster parents, as partners._

_ You see that I have already learned one of the most important lessons that the ancient pure-bloods taught, the one we gave up first when we began to grasp for the slight advantages that our single families could earn: the lesson of cooperation..._

Someone knocked on his door. Draco hastily lifted his quill away so that the ink wouldn't blot on the paper and turned to scowl at it. "What is it?" he snapped.

The door opened, and Fenrir Greyback entered, bowing until his head nearly swept the ground. It wasn't sarcastic as it once would have been, Draco knew, not after Severus had been after him with the Mark and with Legilimency, any more than his aunt Bellatrix was still mad and pretending to be sane. "Pardon, Lord Malfoy," he said. "You wished to be informed when anything strange happened concerning the Potter boy."

"So I did." Draco rose to his feet, his heart blurring in his ears. _So soon? If Potter had broken the Vow, it would have killed him, but he has found some other means of causing trouble so soon? _"What happened?"

Greyback gave another bow. "He has entered the library, and begun looking up information on magical creatures. And Bellatrix saw a white raven near him this morning."

Draco narrowed his eyes. If Potter knew what he was doing, such actions should fall under the Vow that forbade him to stir up rebellion among the Ashborn or seek their destruction. But he might not know what he was doing.

In which case, it was up to Draco to prevent him from finding the wrong books.

_I should have removed them from the library already, _he thought, as he launched into a rapid trot. _But who could have thought that Potter would actually willingly _read _something? _

* * *

Only when Harry stepped into the Ashborn's library did he realize that he had no idea where to go about finding the information he wanted. He stood there and stared around rather helplessly.

He hadn't actually known how the Hogwarts library was organized, either, of course. But there he had had Hermione's help.

_And you'll never have it again._

Harry quelled the thoughts that followed the same way he had quelled missing her and Ron during his holidays with the Dursleys, and set out to look.

The library was a broad room with walls made of the same grey stone that the Ashborn favored everywhere that they weren't favoring black. Harry made a mental note to decorate his rooms, too; he thought he would go mad if he had to look at those colors and nothing else every day. A map on the far wall looked for a minute like it would be an organizational chart of the library, but when Harry studied it more closely, he discovered it wasn't. He turned around and observed the ranks of "reading benches" marching away into the distance, the stacks of books behind them, the shelves in the walls, the free-standing crates stuffed with books, and sighed.

Well. They might have books of the same sort piled together, right? He could check on that fairly easily. And if that was the case, then he should be able to move quickly through the piles by just looking at the top book and determining whether it was about something helpful or not.

To his relief, whoever had set the place up had been methodical enough to do _that. _The first books he found, on Potions brewing, plant identification, _Older Choral Songs of Western Europe, _German, Ancient Runes, and a bunch of other things he didn't bother keeping track of, didn't help. But it did give him a few less tomes to sort through. Sneezing and coughing on the dust, Harry worked his way further in.

He finally encountered an interesting book about halfway down the first set of shelves opposite the map. Harry pulled out the book that said _Lesser-Known Magical Creatures _and noted that the author was Newt Scamander. That might mean this was more of an introductory sort of book, like the magical creatures book he'd used in Hogwarts, but even that would be more than he had now. Harry turned back to the mouth of the aisle so that he could see the book more clearly.

He had time to make out that the cover was red, tough hide of some kind, dusted with gilt from the letters of the title, before someone called out peremptorily, "Potter!"

_Malfoy. _Harry rolled his eyes and tucked the book under his arm. He needed better light to read by, anyway.

Malfoy stood beside the largest bench in the library, his hand pressed flat against the table in front of it as though he assumed that would make him more intimidating. Harry thought unexpectedly of the first Death Eater he'd killed. He'd been a jumped-up, pompous little brat from Durmstrang who'd posed exactly like that.

Well. No matter. It wasn't as though Harry could kill Malfoy. He laid the book down on the table between them and watched Malfoy, waiting for some kind of cue. If there were rules that he needed to obey other than the ones implicit in his Vows, no one had explained them to him.

"What are you _doing _here, Potter?" Malfoy demanded.

"Looking for something to read," Harry said. He didn't need to say anything about Malfoy's lack of observational ability this time; a slow glance from Malfoy to the book was sufficient.

Malfoy's face took on a flush that looked rather like bruises. "I didn't ask you _that, _Potter," he said.

"Yes, you did," Harry pointed out. There was only so much stupidity he could take. "Your exact words were-"

Malfoy banged his hand down; Harry's fucked-up brain reminded him of where the door was and told him a way to break Malfoy's neck. Harry ignored it, as usual, in favor of focusing on Malfoy's latest attempt to sound like he was special and important to Harry. "I _meant_," he said, between grinding teeth, "did you ask anyone if you could go the library? Did you ask which books you could touch, and which books you can't? If you didn't, then you are dangerously close to violation of your Vows!"

"Did you know that when you shout, your face turns pink like a rabbit's nose?" Harry asked in interest.

Malfoy stared at him in silent outrage, which Harry had to admit he preferred to shouting outrage. He glanced down at the book, and was pleased to see that it was thicker and more complicated-looking than he'd thought. "I asked Bellatrix how to get to the library," he said. "She would have prevented me if it was something I wasn't supposed to do. She's too loyal to Snape to let me betray him."

Malfoy went on staring. Harry shrugged. He could answer the git's questions just as well if there wasn't a response. "And if you didn't get the dangerous books out of here before someone could find them and use them against you, you're stupider than I thought. You're _begging _to have someone bring you down."

There was a silent struggle across the table from him, which Harry watched in interest. Then Malfoy said stiffly, "Severus is not stupid. He left the organization of the library up to me, which makes it my fault if you have touched something you should not have."

"Yeah, organization," Harry muttered, with another look at the carelessly stacked books. "You could call it that, if you were desperate for a word."

"You still shouldn't be in here," Malfoy said. "I forbid you to come in again without an escort."

Harry met his eyes and smiled. "You're about the safest escort I could ask for, aren't you? You're the second-in-command of the Ashborn."

Malfoy blinked, as if those weren't words that he was used to hearing. Then again, Harry reckoned, if Snape had compelled all the Ashborn to be loyal to him with mind magic, they wouldn't see a need to flatter Snape's lieutenant. "I didn't give you permission to be here," he said at last.

_When all else fails, retreat into haughtiness. _Harry manfully held back a roll of his eyes. "But you're here now," he said. "And it's only one book. And if I don't do something productive, I'll go mad. A mad Potter could cause a lot of trouble for you even if I do stay within my Vows."

"Is that a threat?" Malfoy's voice skittered up into something a lot like a pig's squeal.

"Yes," Harry said. "Sort of. I won't attack anyone who doesn't attack me first, but I could cause other kinds of havoc. I need something to _do_, Malfoy."

"Why?" Malfoy looked as though Harry was attempting to cram a lemon down his throat and he wasn't enjoying the experience. "For once in your entire life, no one is depending on you to show up and save the day. Everyone involved knows that you _sold _yourself-" he sneered "-to us. You're never going to see the light of the sun again unless we let you. I think most people in that position would take the chance to relax."

"I'm not most people," Harry said, and smiled at the next word that came to his lips. It had been an insult for most of his life; it was about to become a source of strength. "I'm freakishly lucky, freakishly young to have fought the way I did, and freakishly talented at things I'd never done before I came to Hogwarts, like riding a broom. What would make you think I'm normal in this much?"

* * *

Draco frowned. Potter hadn't acted the way he expected so far, and he kept not acting like it. He wasn't the brave, noble Gryffindor martyr praising himself; he wasn't the sulky teenager moping around and trying to make the rest of he world feel sorry for him. He seemed to half-invite Draco to mock him, and spurn the mockery at the same time, if the way his eyes and teeth flashed were any indication.

What was Draco to do with him, then?

One thing was clear. This mask Potter was wearing _was _a mask, and if he could be half as dangerous as Draco's instincts said he could, that meant he needed to know the reality.

"Fine," he said. "Read your book, Potter. But you ought to know that I'll be with you the entire time you do it."

Potter nodded, looking unsurprised. "Fine. Do you want to go into my rooms, or into your rooms, or outside, then?"

"As if I would invite you into my rooms," Draco said, and lowered his voice in response to that implied threat before he could stop himself. "They are my private place, and more than that, they're Severus's private place."

He couldn't define the expression that crossed Potter's face at that, though of course he immediately wanted to try. "All right," Potter said. "Why don't we go outside, then? The glitter in Bellatrix's eyes is a _bit _less creepy when you're seeing it in full sun." He began to walk.

"Does the relationship between me and Severus disgust you, then?" Draco asked, hurrying to catch up with him, glad when he did. Then he was the one who, because he was taller, could force Potter to match his strides and look silly doing it. Potter didn't seem to know he looked silly, though, which took a lot of the pleasure out of it. "You ought to know he wouldn't care if it does."

"Not for the reasons you think," Potter said, head bent as though he wanted to study the ground in front of him for any flaw that would cause him to trip. He wouldn't find it, of course. The Ashborn kept the corridors constantly swept and smooth. "I saw enough people fucking during the war to relieve tension that I don't care if it's two men together, or two women, or what. And I saw greater age gaps dismissed, too."

"What, then?" Draco pressed. He couldn't believe that Potter, of all people, would care that Severus had once been his mentor and in some ways was still, though it was one of the objections Draco could imagine his mother raising.

"I don't think," Potter said, sounding as though he picked his way through a battlefield littered with bones, which he well might, "that anyone deserves to be compelled into sleeping with someone else. If Snape controls you like he controls Bellatrix, you didn't have a free choice, even if you think you do now. I'm sorry for you, that's all." He gave Draco a single, intolerably clear glance from those bright green eyes.

Draco tried for long seconds to come up with words for how insulted he was, and at last resorted to a bewildered shake of his head and slow words. _Slow words for the slow of wit. _"Severus never had to. You've had a look at him as he is now-powerful, strong, and contained with it. Who wouldn't want him?"

"Someone who saw him as he was the night he killed Dumbledore," Potter said quietly.

"You have no idea what that cost him," Draco began with real heat. If Potter was going to _dare _to hint that he was a better person than Severus because of that-

"I know it was more complicated," Potter said. "But I would always wonder about that rage he showed. I would always wonder if he was lying to me with a smooth face. I would always watch him command other people with Legilimency and wonder if he did that to me, and he was so good at it that I just couldn't sense it." He shrugged and tilted his head from side to side. "But that's me. If you're happy with him, good for you."

"But you still pity me," Draco bit out. His emotions were swooping and swirling and churning around in his lungs now. No one had disapproved of the relationship he and Severus had so far; Draco's parents were out of the picture before it happened, and the Ashborn cared about what Severus told them to care about. _Bloody Potter. Trust him to get me all stirred up._

"Of course I do," Potter said, looking him full in the face as if he thought that would make it easier for _him _to use Legilimency on Draco. Draco blinked and controlled the impulse to look away. He would never give Potter that much fuel to use against him, never mind that it would be a sight of his weakness. "But why should that matter to you? I thought nothing I did mattered to you, as long as I wasn't looking in the library without permission." And he _smirked _at Draco, which must have been something he learned to do during the war; Draco had never seen him do it, or seen him interact with anyone who could have taught him to do.

"Come on," Draco said shortly, and led the way outside.

Only later did he remember that he had never made the decision to do that. Potter had. Or rather, he'd suggested and Draco had acceded, instead of fighting the way he thought he should have done.

It made no sense. Draco wasn't in the habit of obeying anyone but Severus, since the Ashborn would do anything he asked of them.

And Potter did nothing interesting the entire afternoon, simply leaned on one elbow and read as though he shared some secret bloodline with his know-it-all Mudblood friend. Once, he did roll over and hold the book above him so that he could read it that way, and Draco tensed, ready to move if he had to. But Potter rolled back the other way, shaking his head when he saw Draco watching him.

"Thought that might let me read the print better," he said. "It didn't."

So it went. Potter was ordinary, or acted ordinary, and didn't question, when the gong for dinner sounded, when he would be allowed to eat in the hall with the rest of the Ashborn. He returned the book to Draco and then fell in behind Bellatrix to go to his rooms with a thoughtful expression on his face.

Draco kept the book. Knowing Potter, he had found some way around the Vow that forbade him from stirring up rebellion, and Draco would keep the book in case he had to find clues to that plan inside it later.

If _he _couldn't find them, then he was sure Severus would. The man had the most exquisitely suspicious mind.

* * *

Draco slid into his seat beside Severus looking flushed and determined. Severus raised an eyebrow. He had heard of no incident in the fortress that day that would demand such emotion. Draco looked the way he did when he used to burst into the potions lab with an announcement for Severus. Severus had trained him out of that by tightening his control over the Ashborn. Now Draco had confidence that they would be able to handle any crisis of defense that arose, and Draco could command them in the rest.

"What happened?" he asked, and settled in to hear some childish tale of woe about runes. Draco wanted to translate Argellus Black's book badly enough to spend hours of every day at it. If his odd reactions did not relate to the tome, then Severus might actually be interested in what he had done.

"_Nothing_," Draco said, helping himself to lima beans with stabs nearly hard enough to break his fork. Severus brushed his hand across Draco's wrist. They had no guest from the Ministry this evening, but it was as well that they got used to practicing the right kind of restraint and courtesy. Then, their mask would not falter in front of those who still had reason to think them bloodthirsty lunatics.

Draco scowled, but took the next few beans more gently, and sagged back in his chair. "Potter went to the library," he said grimly. "He got a book on magical creatures, and I supervised his reading of it. But he acted as though he really _was _only interested in reading it. It was a bloody boring afternoon."

"Language," Severus said, with no more than a touch of frost in his voice. He was caught between amusement at the thought of Potter reading and amusement at Draco's reaction. "Why should his reading material concern you?"

Draco turned around and stared at him. "You mean-Severus, you're going to _let _him study? I thought he was just supposed to stay in his room, and sleep, and eat, and exercise."

Severus took a few bites of his kidney pie before he responded. Draco did not deserve to have his impatience immediately rewarded. "I would put more guards on him if he did that alone," he said at last, when Draco had looked down at his plate and was muttering under his breath in French. He also did not wish to encourage tendencies towards rude language. "I would be sure that he was plotting something. Potter does not cage his restlessness so easily. I would rather that he channel it towards reading than anything else."

"Even though a white raven made contact with him this morning?" Draco challenged.

Severus narrowed his eyes, and said nothing. That was enough to make Draco understand something of what he had done. He looked down at his plate, and turned red enough to make himself unattractive, and began to mash his beans into his pie.

"That should have been the first thing you told me," Severus said. "Do you understand? Instead, you distracted me with rambling thoughts on Potter's book-reading, and no one thought to report the raven to me."

Draco bowed his head. "I'm sorry, Severus," he said, nearly humbly enough to make up for his mistake. "I just-I thought that someone else had told you. Bellatrix is loyal enough to you."

Severus sighed. It was a useful misconception for his enemies to have, that he had done the impossible by bending Bellatrix Lestrange's will to his and healing her insanity, but it had gone too far when Draco believed the lie.

"She is," he said, "but she has no initiative. You know that the bindings I placed in her mind collect and control her thoughts in carefully chosen patterns. Those patterns activate only in response to orders. She could not have told me of the raven unless you had commanded her to."

"Sorry, Severus," Draco whispered. "I'll try better next time."

Severus made his body language a bit more welcoming by leaning back on his chair and sipping from his mug of ale. He did not wish to incite one of Draco's frequent bouts of self-flagellation, which were tiresome to deal with and required the expenditure, or at least the manufacture, of emotions that Severus did not feel often. "You know what the white raven means?" he asked.

Draco seized the offered words as the olive branch they were, and beamed at him. "A sign from the centaurs," he said. "The raven has eyes as black as the night skies and feathers as white as the moon."

Severus nodded, allowing a dry smile to slip through as acknowledgment that Draco had done well in looking up the symbolism. "Yes. But as of yet, the raven has only been sighted in flight. Did it perch near Potter when it examined him?"

By dint of patient questioning, he learned all that Draco knew about the sighting, which was not much. He knew that he would have to question Potter if he wanted the pertinent details, or simply Legilimize the boy. By the time that dinner was finished, he had decided on the latter option. He made his way to Potter's rooms, having sent the impatient, bouncing Draco to wait in the suite they shared. He thought it best to meet with Draco on neutral ground this evening, not territory that belonged to only one of them.

He did not expect his confrontation with Potter to take long. The moment Bellatrix, on guard at the door, saw him, she bowed and cringed and looked up at him with adoration in her eyes that would shame a dog. Severus hid his grimace from long habit. He had not been able to break her of the need to worship someone; the most he had been able to effect there was to transfer it from the late Dark Lord to himself.

"How has Potter behaved?" he asked her, and listened to a stream of details that included eating all his food, doing strange exercises in the morning and evening rounds, making no noise, going to sleep when Bellatrix didn't expect him to, and going to the library for nefarious purposes. Bellatrix did not put it that way, of course; she no longer knew the word "nefarious," or anything near as long. But Severus was a past master at translating the simple language used by those around him into more mellifluous words. He had, after all, taught Neville Longbottom.

Satisfied at last that the boy had done nothing that even trod near the edge of breaking his Vows, he turned the knob and entered. He hoped that Potter would be startled. Severus would teach him to think that he would have any privacy among the Ashborn, any space that was his.

But Potter, lying on the bed, simply looked up at him. His eyes were somnolent, devoid of interest in all senses of the word. He didn't look as though he could be bothered to hate Severus, as that would require effort. "Snape," he said, and started to turn back to the wall he'd been staring at.

Severus did not waste the opportunity. He held out his wand and said softly, "_Legilimens_."

He passed as easily through the barriers of Potter's mind as he ever had. The memories stormed past him, softening and squirting like feces. Severus curled his lip and reached out-

And something knife-edged hit him, hard enough to knock him out of Potter's head. He looked up, ready to see the Vow choking Potter for striking at him when he hadn't done it in self-defense.

But he still stood where he had been a few moments before, and Potter's wand wasn't in his hand. He lay where _he _had been, and watched Severus with a twisted smile.

"I wondered when you would try that," he said conversationally.

"What was that, Potter?" Severus had waited until his voice was no longer breathless, the way he was sure it would have been had he tried to speak at first. The cold silence had the side-effect of intimidating most people he would use it with.

Potter-because he was always the exception, marked by fate, treated specially by Dumbledore, fawned on by the press, able to kill a wizard that no one else could have touched, and Severus felt a savage hatred for that difference moving through him-shook his head and didn't look at all intimidated. "My memories from the war. They have that effect on anyone who tries to Legilimize me. That's just the way it is," he added, with a look of condescension and pity that Severus would have wiped off his face with a detention if they still shared their old roles.

But they did not, and Severus was coming to realize, too late, what that meant. The realization unsettled him. He made mistakes with Draco, but that was natural enough, when Draco was still growing out of youth and Severus had made the choice not to bind him as he had all the Ashborn. He made mistakes with potions, too subtle and complicated an art for anyone to learn all the intricacies of in forty years.

But Potter was neither subtle and complicated nor someone he chose to indulge out of amusement. The source of his misperception must be somewhat else. Severus closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and then opened them to look at Potter again.

He realized part of the problem at once. He had been thinking of Potter during dinner, and at other times, as a boy. What lay on the bed staring at him now was a man.

Not that Potter had grown much taller or broader; not that he had gained a mature sense of humor or seriousness. But he had acquired the trick of looking someone in the eye that Severus associated with adults, who had been through enough conflicts that they did not assume they must win every one.

It was a look that he associated with himself, and Dumbledore, and the way that Lily had looked by the end of school.

He broke himself of the bad habit of comparing Potter to his mother by arching one eyebrow and saying, "And those memories do not destroy your mind?"

"They come in my dreams," Potter said. "Nightmares," he added, perhaps because he believed that Severus did not understand him. In this case, Severus's silence had served its purpose, encouraging its victim to speak more. "I think that's why they don't trouble me during the day."

"You are exactly as stupid as you ever were," Severus said.

"And you wanted to read my stupid thoughts?" Potter tipped his head to one side, the motion like a curious bird's. "You've picked up a masochistic streak I didn't expect. I always thought of you as pure sadist."

Severus ground his teeth and decided that he would not rise to the boy's bait. From the sight of Potter's lips curving, he had caught the grinding noise and knew that he had irritated Severus, if not how profoundly. Severus spoke words that should make Potter forget about the petty triumph he would otherwise claim and gloat over. "Were you aware of what the white raven who saw you this morning represents?"

He knew the raven was a striking-looking bird, though he had caught no more than one glimpse himself. It should be easy to spin a tale of death omens, one of the tales that actually existed about them, and convince Potter that once again he was marked out by fate, though this time in a way that should render him cautious rather than courageous.

"Yes," Potter said.

Severus jarred to a stop, and this time he couldn't hide it. He stared at Potter, who stared back.

The triumph that he had expected from Potter's eyes wasn't present, however. Potter sighed and stretched as though he was attempting to shed some burden that had sat on his spine for too long. "I'd heard about ravens as messengers before. It was important when we went to find-well, it's a long story and not relevant. And I reckon this raven is a messenger from some non-human magical creatures. The way that Bellatrix talked about it, it couldn't be anything else."

_I must caution Bellatrix to restrict her conversation only to Potter's food, exercise, and sleep, _Severus thought.

Then he remembered what Draco had said about Potter going to the library, and realized that even that might not be sufficient. If Potter asked her a question or confronted her with an order that did not relate to one of those three topics, she would have no option but to attack him or to come and ask Severus to interpret her orders for her. Potter, like Draco, like Severus, had free will, which was unusual among the Ashborn.

_I should have thought of that before I agreed to bring him here, _Severus thought. He hated being pulled up by mistakes the way he constantly had been by Potter this evening.

And he disliked and distrusted the reluctant stirring of interest he could feel under his calm watchfulness. His dream had been to have the Ashborn run themselves like a perfectly-made machine while he lived in a world where he did nothing but brew, care for himself, and have sex with Draco. Potter was a broken cog in the machine-no, dust. Severus could envision no circumstances under which Potter might have been a _fitting _cog, after all.

Potter had been rambling on while Severus was thinking of the future, his words soft and warm. "If I could speak to a messenger, what would I learn? Why would they send one to me, anyway? They must know that I'm not going to be leading any wars from in _here. _And if they think there's something special about me still, then I'll tell them the truth quickly enough..."

"You should," Severus said, harshly. Potter glanced up at him with wide eyes, and Severus quietly revised his opinion. There was more than a touch of the child in this "man," still. He could hardly believe Potter had been considered competent to lead and win a war. Assassination of the Dark Lord, yes, but assassination was a coward's task. How Albus could have thought...

That he was the assassin of Albus again brought him to a halt. He took a step forwards. "Remember that you swore to foment no rebellions, Potter."

Potter shook his head, a look of contempt on his face. "What would magical creatures want me for if they _did _intend that? They don't have any reason to rebel against the Ashborn, unless you plan to hunt them all down for Potions ingredients or something. It's the Ministry they would want to stop. It's the Ministry who's treated them poorly."

Severus had not considered that. Potter kept introducing factors that he had not considered.

He hated that.

"You will have no contact with the creatures if they come to you, Potter," he said. "I will have your word on that."

Potter surged upright on the bed, glaring at him. He had got a few inches of growth since the last time Severus had seen him; his head came nearer Severus's chin, even sitting, than expected. But it was not enough to change the boyish look in his eyes. "You already made me swear an Unbreakable Vow! What more do you _want_?"

"This is not a Vow," Severus said coldly. "This is a promise, and as conducive as the Vow will be to keeping peace among my people. Remember that you must dwell among us for the rest of your life, and that we can make your stay here every bit as unpleasant as the war was."

Potter sank back on the bed, his head hanging. He was trying to keep up his defiant posture, but Severus knew the edge of defiance breaking well from his time with Draco. "You're not," he said, and then hissed out a long, rattling sigh of air. "I promise, all right?"

Severus eyed him. Now he thought it was the man he had mistaken for existing. Potter the sulky sixteen-year-old sat there, and never mind the three years that had passed since then.

"Very well," he said, when he had waited some time and Potter had not looked at him again. "See that you keep your word."

And he swept out, mind already on more agreeable matters as he moved.

* * *

Harry waited until he was sure Snape was gone to look up and smile at the door.

It had worked. He had lied to the master liar, manipulated the master manipulator.

Harry leaned back on the bed, chuckling, and stretched his legs out. He was beyond grateful now-though he hadn't felt that way at the time-that Hermione had made him sit down not long after the war began and work out his hatred for Snape. It was a weakness, she argued, for him to obsess over the man like he did, and want to know why he betrayed Dumbledore, and ask over and over again how the Half-Blood Prince had become _him_. If they faced Snape in battle again, it could make Harry want to talk to him, the way he had when they met in battle before the school, instead of just kill him. And killing Snape would always be safer than talking to him.

Harry had figured out that he hated Snape the most for being so good up to a certain point, always defying Harry's suspicions when he thought he was in the wrong, and _then _turning evil. Harry had finally found out about the Unbreakable Vow Snape had sworn to Dumbledore from a Pensieve that Dumbledore had sent to him via delayed owl post, and that did put a few things in perspective.

But even if Snape had killed Dumbledore for good reasons, that didn't give him a good reason for fighting and killing Order members, or for taking over the Death Eaters and turning them into the Ashborn. And if Harry would never feel neutral about him, at least he had figured out, finally, that Snape hated him more than Harry could ever hate him after he learned about the Vow.

That meant Harry could use the hatred to blind him. Snape thought he was a child? He would act like one, and Snape would look no further. He thought that Harry couldn't understand complex magical concepts? Harry would ramble on as though he hadn't, and Snape would be satisfied because that confirmed his prejudices.

So Harry hadn't revealed just what the book had taught him about the raven, and Snape hadn't thought to ask. And Snape had made him promise to have no contact with magical creatures if they came to him.

He hadn't said a thing about Harry reaching out first.

Harry drew his wand and balanced it in the middle of his palm, closing his eyes. The book he'd read had been a standard magical creatures tome throughout most of the chapters, but the last was about Scamander's obsession with communicating with other beings. Some of them, like the centaurs, spoke English but in such a riddling fashion it was hard to understand them; others, like the merfolk, had their own language or, like dragons, entirely different brains.

Scamander had created a spell that he said might work, the incantation literally Latin for "I speak with the animals." But his own attempts to cast it had failed. Defeated, Scamander had admitted that it might take someone who had magical creature heritage to make it work.

_Or, _Harry thought, _another advantage that lends itself to communication with other beings._

_ Like Parseltongue._

_ "Loquor animalibus,_" he whispered, and his wand shook on his hand and a silent wind passed out of his body and struck the wall.

Harry slumped back on his bed with a gasp. He could feel his body all around him, and the walls of his prison, but part of his consciousness was also beyond them, in the clean air, riding the wind that he had summoned and sent to find either the raven or the ones who commanded the raven.

He didn't know what would result from this. He _did _know that it was either do something to keep himself occupied or go mad. And this wasn't against his Vows.

The war had taught him patience, along with so many other things. He closed his eyes and waited to see what the morning would bring.


	3. Perils of Communication

Thank you again for all the reviews!

_Chapter Three-Perils of Communication_

Harry's second full day among the Ashborn was much like the one before. He rose when Bellatrix called to him, she took him out for exercise and he looked for the white raven-this time without seeing it-and he went back in and had breakfast. Once again, nothing in the breakfast was really unfamiliar and nothing was exciting.

Harry swallowed his bread with a small grin. He had to admit that "excitement" as far as food was concerned was something he didn't miss. Huddled under a dripping bush with Hermione and Ron right beside him, sharing dried meat and fruit and trying not to think about the Death Eaters stumbling around behind them...

Harry cut the memory off with a shudder. If he thought too much about it, then it would turn into a memory of Seamus's death, and he preferred not to relive that.

"Speak."

Harry glanced up in surprise. Bellatrix stood by the door, beckoning him, although he hadn't finished his meal. Harry hastily swallowed the food he was chewing, palmed a few scraps for later the way he'd done it for the snake the day before yesterday, and stood up to follow her.

They passed some Ashborn on the way. All of them looked once at Harry and then seemed to dismiss him, perhaps because the woman guiding him had to be the most fanatically loyal of all. Harry watched their focused eyes and the way they walked, never varying from their paths. All of them seemed to have agreed as to what those paths would be in advance, so that they never bumped into one another. He could envy them that unity of purpose.

Then he shuddered. _No, I won't, not when they probably only have it because Snape's controlling them all._

They turned away from the large, blank doors of the library, to Harry's disappointment. He had thought he might stand a decent chance of sneaking a book out if Malfoy or Snape wanted to speak him there. He'd had plenty of practice at sleight-of-hand during the war, when his life had depended on concealing a weapon more than once, and might have succeeded at it yesterday if Malfoy hadn't surprised him.

_And if the book hadn't been so big. _As Ron would say, "Know what you can do and what you can't in your own head, even if you brag out loud."

Harry clamped his lips shut. He hated to admit, even to himself, how much he missed Ron and Hermione, because he knew it would get worse before it got better. He might have letters; he doubted that Snape would permit him any visits.

_I chose this. This is the way life is going to be, and you should have killed yourself if you couldn't bear it._

There was, in fact, no provision in the Vows against suicide. Harry stroked the thought briefly, then put it away as Bellatrix halted in front of a large wood-paneled door and knocked twice. He would have to think about it later, when he wasn't around two people who were watching in paranoid anxiety for him to try something.

"Enter," said Snape's dry voice, and Harry stepped through, faintly surprised. He had assumed that Malfoy would have the task of baby-sitting him for the day. He was sure it must be boring for Snape.

The room beyond was the most interesting space he'd seen yet in Ashborn territory. There were three fireplaces, spaced apart from each other in a triangle; in fact, Harry thought, the room itself only had three walls. All of the fireplaces were going in a blaze, which made Harry cast a Cooling Charm on himself. The light played over a large, round table in the center, with three chairs arranged about it. Snape and Malfoy were sitting in two of them. Bellatrix marched forwards and halted against the wall, large, quivering eyes fixed on Snape, so Harry reckoned that the third chair was for him. He took it, studying the thing in the center of the table.

After a few minutes of staring, "thing" was still the best name that he could come up with for it. It resembled a cylinder covered with rings of different metals. Harry thought he could identify iron, silver, and gold, but the others were a mystery to him. He tried to count them, but the effort made his eyes water. For one thing, some of the rings were entwined with and buried beneath others.

For another, it was perfectly obvious that the thing was the focus of powerful magic. Harry leaned back in his seat and looked from Snape to Malfoy, awaiting some explanation.

Snape stayed still, his hands clasped in front of him, his legs crossed at the ankles. He looked as though he could hold the pose for hours, entirely comfortable. Malfoy, on the other hand, was perched at the very edge of the chair, fidgeting back and forth. His eyes were locked on Harry, and his forehead had a beading of sweat.

_Use a Cooling Charm, idiot, _Harry thought. He wondered if Snape had willed him not to, and felt another stab of pity for Malfoy. He was nowhere near as free or powerful as he thought he was.

Harry had played the waiting game with Death Eaters, with Order members reluctant to acknowledge that a teenager _had _to take a leading role in this war, and with Voldemort himself. It took more than two stares to unnerve him. He studied the object instead, and had just made out that it stood on three evenly spaced fins that looked like rocket fins and echoed the spacing of the chairs and the fireplaces when Malfoy lost it and spoke.

"You're going to help us use your magic," he said harshly.

"If you're planning to drain me," Harry said, hiding the way his adrenaline spiked and his mouth dried out, "then I believe that counts as something I can defend myself against."

Snape spoke up, eyes passionless as a fly's. "You misunderstand. Our device has the makings of an _incubitum_ from many powerful wizards. But there is little that either Draco or I can do to affect it now, it possesses so much magic from us. We wish you to focus your power on it."

Which sounded simple enough, but... "Its name implies that it's a concentration of something," Harry said. "What? And what are you going to do with the power?"

Snape paused. Harry didn't think he would have noticed it if Snape hadn't been lifting his hand to, apparently, touch the device, and his fingers froze for a moment in midair. Harry's fucked-up brain noticed it happen, of course. Such moments could be the ones right before an enemy pulled a wand or flung something as a distraction, and his instincts wouldn't let him forget that.

"You have read of this," Snape said.

"Not really," Harry said. "Or I would already know the answer." He squinted at the device, which shimmered as though it was passing through a mirage now. "I just know what the word _incubitum _means. And I won't lend you my magic if it's going to be used in a way that hurts people."

"You know the word," Malfoy said, sounding as if that particular revelation destroyed the world as he knew it.

Harry glanced at him and raised an eyebrow. "Yes. I studied Latin during the war, when I realized that it could be useful for more than just making my enemies laugh when I tried to pronounce it. I needed it to grasp and invent some spells." He peered at the device again. The latest shimmer had faded, but that left him no closer to understanding it.

"I have sworn a Vow not to use magic against your former associates," Snape said. He spoke as though someone had stuck a fork down his throat. Harry wondered if the git was really _that _irritated about him knowing Latin. _Irritated at the way it messes up his preconceptions of me, probably. _"Do you think that I would attempt to break it, if I was going to, in front of you, with a device this simple?"

"There are other people you could use it against," Harry said.

"Such as who?" Oh, Snape was definitely speaking through gritted teeth now.

"The Ashborn," Harry said. "And that would make a neat way for you to have me break my Vows at the same time, since I swore not to hurt them except in self-defense." He closed his eye and reached out with-well, he thought of them as "tendrils" since he envisioned them that way, but Hermione got all stroppy when he said the word, so Harry reckoned it was something more like another sense. Snape and Malfoy weren't about to let him cast a spell that would tell him anything about the _incubitum,_ so he would see what he could discover about it this way.

The sensation that came back to him was one of intense cold. Harry frowned, opening his eyes. Healing magic registered as warm to him, death magic as slimy, and defensive magic as a beaming light. He didn't think that he'd ever felt cold before without some other sensation to mix into it and lessen it.

"We do not intend to make you break your Vows," Snape said. His voice had deepened. Someone was not only sticking the fork down his throat, but twisting it around so that it gripped his intestines and wound them in all sorts of directions, likely.

"But that would be the easiest way to get rid of me," Harry said, and smiled at him. "And I don't think that you really want me around all the time, hostage deal or not."

* * *

_No one talks to Severus that way._

Draco watched the interactions happening in front of him in somewhat of a daze. He was used to cringing appeasement from the emissaries the Ministry sent them, complemented by deference from the Ashborn and Severus's patient answers to his own eager questions. Someone didn't defy Severus this way, _casually, _without even anger or hatred behind the words to give them a reason to exist.

Oh, logically Draco knew that Potter must hate Severus. The risks he'd taken and some of the things he said only made sense if seen that way. But he didn't show it, and seemed more interested in the _incubitum _than either of them.

Draco glanced at Severus from the corner of one eye, and found that he was sitting too still, his eyes fixed on Potter. When he looked like that, he would strike. Draco had never seen a situation where he didn't.

And if he did, that would free Potter to strike back. Draco knew Severus would win the contest in the end, because he was stronger and smarter and faster than anyone else in the world. But Potter had fought in a war, and had casually revealed abilities just now that he shouldn't have had. It was possible that he might hurt Severus.

Draco didn't want that to happen, so he started talking. "I can't believe that you care so much about the Ashborn," he told Potter flatly. "Not when so many of them were your enemies until Severus took them in hand, and not when you killed so many of the Death Eaters in the war."

"That was Death Eaters," Potter said, turning on him in a way that said he was glad to have a weaker opponent than Severus. Draco hid a vicious smile. Potter was a weakling and, under the shell of Gryffindor bravery, a coward. That was worth knowing. "Not Ashborn."

"They're the same groups," Draco said, and deliberately didn't touch his left arm. He had borne the Dark Mark there until Severus changed it to the black eagle. But Draco's Mark was different from any other, and he didn't want to show it to Potter. Potter didn't deserve to see it.

"No," Potter said. "The name change isn't the only thing that separates them. Their goals, and who they obey, and what they fight for, are different, too. I think that my people can coexist with the Ashborn, or I would never have made this bargain. They couldn't have coexisted with Voldemort."

"You think that we can." Severus's voice was soft. Draco took a quick glance at him and saw that the need to strike had vanished from his face. He was sitting back from the table, his hands once again resting loosely in his lap. Draco swallowed, basking in such relief that he nearly didn't hear Potter's reply.

"Coexist with Voldemort?" Potter grinned, apparently enjoying the way Severus's face shut down when he heard the name. That only confirmed Draco's suspicion that Potter was an arsehole. "No. But coexist with my people, yes." His eyes and his face went cool. "If I had thought that you would find a way around the Vows and destroy my people, or that you couldn't or wouldn't make the Vows, then yeah, I would have fought to the bitter end."

"Thus dooming all those who depended on you." Draco flinched. Severus's contempt stung him like hot sand flung into his nostrils. He wondered how Potter could stand it.

"I would have died fighting you," Potter said. He didn't sound upset about it. He sounded like it was _normal. _Draco frowned. He had thought that Potter was someone who would rather go on existing, do anything to go on existing, than die. Had he been wrong? Perhaps not, if Potter was imagining all death to be noble. "But then someone else would have come along and compromised. I would be gone, though. I would be dead. Yeah, I would be incapable of existing in the same world as someone who was basically Voldemort come again."

Again the flinch. Draco leaned forwards, wanting to take some of the burden of the conversation from Severus, as well as lead it in a direction that would hopefully aim away from the name that hurt them both. "None of that has anything to do with the situation in front of us, Potter."

"The _incubitum_?" Potter asked, turning back to it. "No, it doesn't. If you'll explain to me what it does, then I might consider giving it some of my magic."

Severus laid one hand flat on the table. Draco had seen him do the same thing when pinning down a piece of parchment, and he relaxed a little. He didn't think Severus was upset, not if he was doing that.

"You need understand only this," Severus said. "That it is a ward, of an unusual kind. It lets us prevent threats rather than react only at their approach. We can fight offensively instead of defensively."

Potter looked once more at the rings of metal that encircled the _incubitum_, then turned to Severus. "You mean it lets you see the future where your enemies attack, rather than just sit there until they come?" he asked.

Draco gaped. Severus made a sharp gesture, and Draco shut his mouth. Potter's eyes had already noted his expression, and he smiled a little. Draco ducked his head in shame. He hadn't meant to give that much away.

"How did you make it work?" Potter asked, almost as if talking to himself. "Divination is neither art nor science, as Hermione would say...oh, that's it, isn't it? You need a lot of power. That's why you need so much magic from everyone who'll live under the protection of the ward."

Severus's face was a study. Draco ducked his head again almost the minute he looked up, and bit his lip, struggling to understand his own conflicting impulses. Of course he was baffled and upset that Potter had guessed the purpose of the _incubitum _that easily, but...

But...

But he also had to look away from Severus so that he could fight the desperate urge to laugh.

* * *

Severus had not known.

No one could have figured it out who did not know, let alone a Potter who was desperately behind on magical theory, a class not offered at Hogwarts. He had never attended to the small scraps of theory that Severus offered during his classes, either, and Severus _knew _that the boy did not have the kind of brain that would seek out such material because he took a delight in it.

There must have been cheating of some kind.

But immediately Severus's mind hit the barriers of his own logic and rebelled, because who would have told Potter about the _incubitum _and what it could do? The Ashborn obeyed Severus. Draco had no reason to disobey him. Severus himself was not in the habit of sleepwalking and blurting out secrets he wished to keep silent to immature boys who thought the world revolved around them and presumed to make moral pronouncements that most of the Ashborn would have laughed at.

No, he did not know how Potter would have learned what the ward did. Perhaps he should simply put it down to a lucky guess and move on. Already he had spent too much time considering this, and Potter was beginning to turn bright eyes away from the _incubitum _and watch Severus. He might learn too much from his silence.

"Will you contribute magic or not?" Severus asked. "The ward might function better if you do. On the other hand, you have no reason to feel loyalty to us."

"If you're actually thinking about protecting me, I might have reason to feel more," the brat said, and of course there was insolence in his voice. All pride and insolence; why had Severus ever thought he would be otherwise? "But I also only have your word for it that that's what this thing does." He reached out to flick a fingernail against the lowest ring of metal, the gold.

Severus snatched for his hand, but too late. The _incubitum _blurred, and Potter ended up flung across the room, hitting his head on the far wall and slumping down with a little groan. His body shook as though someone was standing just out of sight and wringing him like a wet cloth. Severus could understand the temptation.

Potter stopped shaking a moment later, and lay there for a minute breathing. Draco reached out one hand, then drew it back against his side, shooting an abashed look at Severus out of the corner of his eye. Severus looked back with calm sternness. He would not forget the gesture, although perhaps it had only meant that Draco wanted to make sure Potter was not dead, rather than that he wanted to help him.

Potter sat up in the corner and put a hand to the back of his head. He nodded to himself, then staggered to his feet and made his way back to the table.

"Will it do something like that to anyone who _does _try to bypass the wards, if they get that far?" he asked.

Severus blinked. "It was meant only to defend itself if someone discovered what it was and tried to destroy it."

"A simple touch is destruction?" Potter looked at the _incubitum _exactly as if it had not injured him-or, more likely, Severus thought, as though it was something he could respect because it had. "No, I think it has other defensive properties. If you could make a backup system based on it if its predictions fail and someone does manage to attack the Ashborn on their own ground..."

"I would be the one to make any decision," Severus replied as repressively as he could, when Potter seemed to have changed masks and forms with someone else yet again. His eyes glinted, and he was leaning forwards as if peering at the rings of metal would let him see under the surface to the _incubitum's _secret.

"Yeah, yeah," Potter said, in such a faint voice that Severus didn't think he meant offense. It would have been more offensive-and more interesting-to have Potter focused on dismissing him instead of ignoring him. "But there are possibilities here. I'd like to contribute magic to something that would keep me safe, like I said. But it could keep all of us safer if we focused on the offense as well as on the defense. Which _would _be defense at the same time, see?" He looked up with a face that shone.

"I do not."

Something in Severus's voice, perhaps his tone, got through to the stubborn boy at last. His face shut, and he nodded. "Then I'd prefer not to contribute any magic," he said, and stood up and walked back to the door where Bellatrix waited for him. "Thanks all the same."

Bellatrix hesitated, looking back and forth between Potter and Severus with liquid dark eyes. Severus gestured violently, and she started and hurried after Potter. She reached out as if she would put one hand on his shoulder to guide him, but Potter dodged her without looking back and kept walking.

Severus shut his eyes and leaned back in his chair. That had not turned out as he wished, but that was no reason to deny himself basic amenities such as rational thought. The blazing hatred that had sprung up in him as pale blue fire would simply have to wait. He needed this morning free and calm for working on the _incubitum _and then perfecting a potion that would let him know if his mental control over the Ashborn was slipping.

"Severus?"

Draco's quiet voice was the last straw. Severus opened his eyes and shook his head, unable to speak. Luckily, the gesture he made towards the door needed no words to translate it. Draco reared to his feet, his face bright and frightened, and ran for it.

Alone, Severus lowered his head and placed his hands over his face.

He did not know why, of all the people he had encountered, killed, fought, taught, and been tortured by, only Potter had the ability to irritate him like this.

* * *

The bump on the back of Harry's head hurt.

But it also seemed to have paid for itself twice over. Snape and Malfoy didn't summon him again.

Now and then he saw them, of course, because he would pass Malfoy in the corridors, clutching a sheaf of parchment or a book and looking abstracted, or Snape on his way to the lab. On one memorable occasion, he saw Snape-although he didn't think Snape saw him, because he didn't try to _Obliviate _Harry-walking half-naked, holding a drenched and dripping robe in front of him. It looked as though someone had soaked it with emerald-colored paint.

Harry bit his lip hard to keep from laughing. It cheered him up a little, to know that even the Great Snape could have potions blow up in his face on occasion.

The little snake came back to him the fourth evening he was there, with many complaints about how long the journey was and how many people had tried to kill him before they realized he was carrying a letter. Harry sympathized, and murmured, and fed him scraps of food until the snake was satisfied and went to sleep next to his pillow. Then he tore open the letter Ron and Hermione had sent him.

No, wait, there were two letters. One was Ron's, scratched and ink-stained as though his best friend had spent a lot of time trying to decide what to say. Harry could understand that. Ron had agreed to Harry's plan, but it took a lot of persuasion, and he had volunteered to go himself as a hostage instead.

_Snape might have agreed to that. If he'd thought I wouldn't dare do anything to him as long as he held Ron, which I wouldn't have..._

Harry shook his head impatiently. No, that was being selfish. He wouldn't wish this cheerless hell on anyone, but especially not Ron, who had his family and his life with Hermione to look forward to.

_Dear Harry,_

_ How did the world get so _quiet _with you gone? _(The word quiet was underlined three times, and then Ron had gone back and put a line above it, too). _I don't understand it._

_ Everyone here misses you. I've caught Mum crying twice, although she tries to put a brave face on it. George and Fred keep swearing they'll come up with some way to get you out of there, because the Vows didn't say anything about jokes or pranks. Dad keeps saying how much better things would be if you were here. And Ginny just sits at meals sometimes and stares off into the distance. _

Harry sighed and leaned back on the pillow, shaking his head. He and Ginny were-difficult. They'd dated for a bit in sixth year, and then Dumbledore and Snape and Malfoy had happened, and Harry had decided that he couldn't take her on the Horcrux hunt. She had helped in other ways, though, especially with setting up the trap that had ultimately lured Voldemort into a place where they could take him.

And sometimes they were passionate and Harry knew she had forgiven him. And then they'd have another argument about how much Harry was willing to risk his life but not hers, and there would be cold weeks or months of silence again.

He would have to hope that Ginny found someone else, and that she was only reacting so badly because his absence was new. He knew that he couldn't be the kind of husband and lover she needed.

_Hermione's going to send you her own letter, so I won't say anything about her, but Merlin's saggy testicles, mate, I miss you. There's no one here to play Quidditch with who does it right. There's no one to share the memories with. There's no one to plan with. Everyone else except us seems to have decided that the peace is the important thing, and they don't want to talk about what we had to give up to get it._

Harry shrugged. He hadn't expected anything less. Actually, he wouldn't mind if the outside world, except for his friends, forgot about him. It would prevent them trying to sneak in something or someone that would tempt him to break his Vows.

_And I'd better stop here, because I sound all bitter and upset, and you're probably enduring more than I ever can. Let's hope that we can see each other again someday, mate. _

_ Ron._

Harry waited a long, silent moment, and then put Ron's letter to one side. He would have to think a while before he could write the reply that a letter like that deserved. Hermione's was probably going to be easier in some ways.

It was, although not for all the reasons that Harry had expected. Hermione spent less time talking about her own anger and grief because Harry had been taken hostage by the Ashborn and more talking about speculations surrounding the magical nature of Unbreakable Vows.

_If there's a Vow made that only uses the original wands, then you can break free of them if you break your wand and pick up a new one. Or if you take over someone else's wand. At least, that's what some of the books say. They don't give examples of anyone who's actually succeeded in doing that and defying the Vows, except in legends. Still, I'm going to write to Ollivander and see if he can teach me something about wandlore. It's got to be worth a chance._

Harry frowned. He would write back to Hermione as soon as possible, then, because he really didn't want her to spend too much time on this. He was-not entirely content with where he was, but willing to endure, especially now that Snape and Malfoy were leaving him alone. He didn't want to take the chance of breaking the Vows.

Especially because that would probably shatter the endurance that was allowing him to live and fill him with hope again. There was no way he could stay here for the rest of his life if he knew there was a way out of the Vows, even a remote chance of one.

_But it's really better that I be here. War would be worse than anything the Ashborn can do to me._

Harry glanced at the sleeping snake and smiled. Even if he wrote his letters to Ron and Hermione right now, it would probably be a few days before the snake would agree to be Apparated again and go through the tedious journey to deliver them. He could do something else before then.

He rose to his feet, took up his wand, and looked around speculatively.

In the meantime...

In the meantime, he was going to see what he could do about getting some colors on these goddamn walls.

* * *

Draco leaned back in his chair and stretched his arms over his head, listening to the popping of bones in his back. Then he picked up another cold forkful of duck with orange sauce and ate it, staring into the fire. He would have liked to share both the meal and the magical massage he'd need after sitting in the same chair for so long with Severus, but this was one of the evenings that Severus had locked himself in the lab and seemed inclined to stay there.

Besides, his body felt, at the moment, like only a simple container for the whirling insights that he had finally begun to pluck from the tangled branches of Argellus Black's book.

Ancient pure-blood society had never been the separate set of fortresses and heavily-armed, carefully-negotiating families that Draco had dreamed it was. It was, indeed, based on the ideal of cooperation that a few families like Lady Jocelyn's still followed, and the notion of links and bonds and intertwining and split loyalties and multiple marriages and different kinds of alliances.

It was...

It was far more complicated than Draco had envisioned. Less individualist. Less committed to the notion that families must advance and have their own children. Most of the families that Draco had read about, or the casual references to families dropped among the runes of the book he was translating, were of that mixed and blended kind. The children were someone else's children as well as your own. Instead of one partner marrying into a family and giving up their heritage so that their children would only be heirs of one particular bloodline, they always knew they came from two or more origins, and their children would have all those origins as well as the origins carried in the blood of the other partner.

Draco's mother had always told him that genealogy was a pastime of the Black side of the family. Draco had wondered how that could be. Surely you learned your own family tapestry and the tapestries of the other major pure-blood families, and you were done.

Now he saw why it could keep someone's attention occupied. People changed throughout their lives. They could be exiled from one of their birth families, fostered in a new one, adopted, changed in such profound ways by powerful magic that they became different people. They could marry many times, all at once or sequentially; the mother of one child might have that child alone as her direct heir, because all her others were borne as parts of business arrangements for other families and would only become a permanent part of her household if they willed it. But in the meantime, they were summer visitors, and they had their own feuds and alliances and business arrangements. To be a master of genealogy meant that you knew who someone was likely to be at any given moment, not just the moment of their birth, and often where they were going to be and who they liked spending time with, as well.

Draco bowed his head and rested his forehead on his elbows, thinking. He hadn't sent the letter to Lady Jocelyn with his suggestions for their child-producing alliance yet, and he was glad that he hadn't. While a woman from that family would appreciate his acknowledgment that the child was a part of two families, not just the Malfoys, and the money he offered, she would also expect to evaluate Draco as a person before she bore the child. And depending on who he approached, she might or might not agree to use the magic that would ensure the child was born male. Draco had chosen Jocelyn's name because she was the only woman in that family circle who was exactly his age. But she might not be the right one.

He would need to study more before he really understood what it _meant, _to be part of a cultural tradition like that. And before he decided whether that was the sort of culture he wanted to build among the Ashborn, surrounding his child, or not.

Draco lifted his head and shook it in bemusement, glancing at the book of runes again. He had wondered, when the outlines of this strange society first began to come clear, _why _they would want to do something like that. The way his own family and most of the others he knew of-the Parkinsons, the Notts, the Blacks, the Greengrasses, the Longbottoms-had operated made more sense to him. You had a few heirs in the direct male line, and the families circled and dueled each other to get ahead in the Ministry and wizarding society in general. Why would anyone want to be so tied and bound that it was impossible to take a business or political step without involving a bunch of other people?

Now he felt as though his translating self of a few weeks ago was impossibly naive. To _prevent war, _of course. The Dark Lords who had plagued their society had started arising the moment some of the pure-bloods had abandoned their old culture in the rush to get ahead. When people considered themselves opposed instead of bound, they would be far more likely to go to war.

Those old pure-bloods had understood a truth that it had taken Draco long, painful years to recognize: that they were a small culture. The Muggles far outnumbered them, and would overwhelm wizards if they spent all their energy in fighting each other. If they were bound, they could continue growing and thriving, and something that diminished one family would be seen as diminishing everybody, because it _would. _Your sister or your sister-wife or your cousin or your mother-in-law or your blood-brother would be the one affected.

Draco exhaled again and rubbed the back of his neck. In some ways, he didn't think he would have a hard time persuading Severus or the Ashborn to agree with him that this lifestyle was better. After all, Severus wasn't interested in war, or he would never have agreed to a truce with Potter's people. It was far more likely that he wouldn't agree to the notion of being bound to someone. Severus wanted people bound to _him_, unable to exist without him. Not the other way around.

Draco paused, and his heartbeat went so fast that for long moments he seemed to be hearing it instead of his own thoughts. Although his thoughts were the things dancing and curving in his head, racing around each other like clashing waves.

He had _never _thought something like that before. Never. He had honored and admired Severus as the only one with the strength to take over the Death Eaters and make them into the Ashborn. He had watched him pound Bellatrix's mind to powder and craft a new whole artifact out of it, which Draco knew even someone experienced in Legilimency would have found hard. He knew that Severus hadn't been able to save his parents, but then, Draco couldn't, either, and he had more motive to try, so why should he blame someone else for not being able to do it?

Draco leaned back in his chair and stared at the ceiling. His main anxiety, up until this time, had been persuading Severus that he should be _allowed _to spend his time on translating the book of runes and integrating them into a new pure-blood culture. But who was Severus to give or deny him permission?

Why had Draco felt as though he was in subjection to Severus, when he had insisted to Potter that he wasn't?

Draco cast some massage charms and closed his eyes. Then he called on his Ashborn guards for wine to ease the bitter taste of revelation.

If he was going to think about things as unpleasant as this, he might as well do it in comfort.

* * *

Severus stepped back and narrowed his eyes at his new automaton. The snake lay across the table, segmented in body like a caterpillar, the segments chased with silver and decorated with small, semiprecious gems of the kind that were common among the Ashborn, since Severus had directed all of them to surrender the family heirlooms they wouldn't need anymore. The snake's head was appropriately fang-festooned, and Severus knew that once he loaded the hollow teeth with poisons of his own devising, they could stop anyone who broke through the wards.

But so far, the simple animation spells and other charms to make it obey his commands that he had tried had failed.

Severus measured his own breath out in careful pants, so that he would not sound irritated to someone who burst into the lab that moment. He knew the reason for the failure. These spells were too limited; the snake had to be able to react to sudden threats instead of simply fetching him ingredients or cutting them on command. And Severus had trouble directing even Bellatrix, someone with native intelligence of her own, to that extent.

There was a possible solution, one he had read in a book months ago and dismissed because at that time he had had no chance of effecting it. But now he did. Now he had a Parselmouth living in his home.

Severus leaned back on the table that had supported several unsuccessful experiments so far and studied the snake. It did not shift for all the power of his glaring at it, although he would have preferred that it do so.

He sought to understand his own instinctive revulsion to the thought of asking Potter for help. Of course, it was Potter, and of course he did not want to encourage the boy to think of him as weak or needy.

But he had been ruthlessly practical, or thought himself so, in the last few years. He had been willing to make sacrifices that he would have preferred not to make, he had compromised where that was necessary, because his end goal-a sheltered and protected mini-world where he could do just as he liked-was more important to him than fleeting inconveniences along the way.

Surely asking Potter for help would be another such minor inconvenience. Surely it should not be something that made him grit his teeth against the thought and feel, with a spasm of distaste, that he would die rather than do so.

He would not die rather than do so. If he was dangling above an abyss and Potter's was the only hand that could drag him to safety, he would certainly grasp it. He was being childish and hyperbolic.

Severus gazed at the snake and marshaled his thoughts again. Did he fear the boy's taunting? He had more than enough taunts of his own, and he had had no opportunity during the past three years to say them, which would give them all the sting of freshness. Did he think that the Ashborn would decide he was weak? Not so. They thought nothing except what he told them. Draco and Potter were the only free ones.

He did not want to, he decided at last. He could get along without the snake automaton. He did not need Potter's help to make it come to life because he did not need the snake to serve him. There were others he could rely on, and the _incubitum, _once fully-powered, would be all the defense they could ever need.

He turned away from the table and made his way to the cauldron. The green liquid inside shimmered and shifted, and Severus put his head down to study the color from a shorter distance. He needed to know how soon he should add the bay leaves that even now awaited his pleasure on the palms of his hound automaton.

The cauldron exploded in his face.

Severus jerked back quickly enough to save his eyesight. He should have seen the telltale small green bubbles rising to the surface, he thought as he stared at his stained robes. They would have to be thrown away. They would not wash.

This was his fault. His and his alone.

In a fit of rage, he drew his wand and destroyed the cauldron with a spell that wound fire around it and consumed it fast enough to drown even the stink of the burning potion.

It was not rational, and he prided himself on being rational. This was not good.

But...

It was done, and he set out to find new robes and a way of disposing of the old ones with new dignity.

He refused to consider that he had been irrational all day, and so should question some other decisions he had made.


	4. Stirrings of Interest

Thank you again for all the reviews!

_Chapter Four-Stirrings of Interest_

"Your room looks different."

Bellatrix didn't sound as though she thought that was allowed. Harry grinned over his shoulder at her as he pulled on a light shirt; the last few days had been increasingly warm, and he'd rather not have to Transfigure in the middle of his exercise. "Did Snape tell you I couldn't do that?"

After a hopeless moment of staring, since this was beyond the bounds of her orders, Bellatrix led him outside as though nothing had happened. Harry went with her, content. He didn't think Snape would care much even if Bellatrix reported the changed colors to him. What did Harry Potter's room matter in the grand scheme of brewing potions and mind-controlling people?

_He probably does more than that. _

Harry shrugged to himself as he jogged in light circles around the grassy courtyard. And what did that matter to _him_? It seemed as though Snape's last attempt to approach him would be about the _incubitum. _Harry couldn't imagine that Snape would be interested in any other communication after how badly _that _had failed to work out.

When he came back into the room and Bellatrix served him breakfast-exclusively fresh fruit this time, as though someone in the kitchen had something against meat-Harry leaned back on his pillows while he ate and stared around. The room's bright colors probably clashed, because Harry had never had an eye for that kind of thing, but no one else had to live here. He had therefore pleased himself in a way he never could, not in the Dursleys' cupboard and second bedroom, not in the common bedroom shared by the boys in Gryffindor Tower, not in the frequently changed shelters they ran from and to during the war.

Along the righthand wall as he lay against the headboard was a cheerful outdoor scene, a blue sky filled with white clouds above a bright green meadow spangled with crocuses and dandelions. Harry had chosen the flowers on purpose; they were hardy and kept coming back no matter what winter or people did to keep them away. He thought that was a good thing to remind himself of.

The lefthand wall, where the door to the bathroom was, had an evening scene instead, with the sun sinking down in blazing red and purple across an ocean. Harry was particularly proud of the way he'd done the waves there, rippling forwards with their own shadows and own lights, and grateful to Hermione for teaching him the spell that would imprint precise and specific images from one's imagination on a flat surface. He could have spent ages trying to move colors into position with his wand, or use paint, and never have got it right.

The wall where the door stood was painted like a cave, working with the natural grey of the stone. Exciting, twisting and turning corridors lay just out of sight, and Harry had painted a sleeping green dragon curled up on one rocky ledge, with the gleam of gold from beneath it. He had thought about giving the dragon Snape's eyes, but just in case Snape ever _did _care, Harry had showed the dragon with eyes shut instead. This was becoming his home now, his private sanctuary, and he didn't want it destroyed by Snape in a temper tantrum.

The wall behind the headboard, he'd done the least with, because he kept his back to it most of the time, but it showed a dim room with hints of red and gold that could have been the Gryffindor common room if you squinted. Harry was fairly confident that he was the only one who would get the reference, because none of the Ashborn had been Gryffindors. The fire flickered on someone asleep on the couch. It could have been Ginny; it could have been Hermione. Harry had deliberately left it up to interpretation.

He'd also Transfigured one of the unnecessary blankets on the bed into a thick white rug that he'd cast over the stone floor of the room. If he needed it when it was winter, then he could Transfigure it back, but for now cold feet were more of a problem for him than cold limbs.

"This is much changed," Bellatrix said. Harry had the impression that she'd spent all her time staring at one wall after another, turning slowly in place like a robot, while he ate.

"Yes, it is," Harry said, and smiled at her. It was so strange, to think that he was sitting here in a stronghold of the enemy eating food they'd provided him that wasn't drugged or poisoned-at least, he didn't think it was-and discussing the way he'd painted his room with the woman who'd murdered his godfather. But then, nothing about his life had _ever _worked out the way he predicted it. If it had, Harry thought _that _might have been the catalyst to make him scream and run, not everything else. "I wanted more of the outdoors than I'm allowed, so I brought it in to me."

Bellatrix raised an arm, which shook as though she was unused to the gesture. Harry ducked out of the way from habit, but she only pointed at the scene of the common room behind him. "That is not outdoors."

Harry shrugged. "No. But it's still a place that I can't be right now." _That I'll never see again._

He rolled his eyes at himself and started finishing his breakfast, which he'd rather delayed by chasing grapes into his sleeves and putting them under Preservation Charms. Old habits died hard, and if Snape ever took a pointer from the Dursleys and decided that Harry couldn't eat, then at least he would have enough to sustain a few days of life.

"Why do you want to go back to it?'

Harry blinked up at Bellatrix. "That was very nearly an intelligent question," he said, in confidence that she wouldn't get angry at him. "Are you supposed to be talking to me this way?"

She blinked, and a glaze seemed to slide over her eyes, as though it had been waiting there for the moment she needed it. "No," she said, and stood there after that like a pillar, although she still stared at the scene of the common room behind his headboard.

_Poor thing, _Harry thought, and tried not to feel the grapes and berries and peaches turning to mush in his stomach. _I never thought I'd feel pity for someone like her, but there it is. Dying when Voldemort did would have been better for her than this. _

And he was restricted from doing much about it, since he'd sworn not to foment rebellion among the Ashborn.

Harry frowned, and ate, and fed a few grapes to the small snake when he woke-he complained that fruit needed blood to be palatable-and thought. There was no way that he could break his Vow without dying, no way that he could break through the mental control that Snape had exerted over his followers when he was such a poor Legilimens himself...

But he had to do _something. _This was pathetic. Not even the Ashborn deserved to breathe and eat and die and _think _only because Snape commanded them to.

The only two tactics that came to him, after long hours of thinking, were both a bit hopeless. First, wait for the message he had sent out to the magical creatures behind the white raven to have some effect. It hadn't so far.

Second, talk to Malfoy, the only one other than himself here who had free will.

* * *

Draco went for a walk in the eastern gardens that morning. He wished to avoid Severus while these uncomfortable revelations banged and bumped about in his skull like rolling eggs.

Not that Severus would care, or see him right now. The mornings and afternoons were Severus's time for brewing and working on his automatons and the defense problems of the Ashborn. Most of the time, Draco would see him only at the evening meal, and then sometimes afterwards when they fucked each other.

He had been content with that, until the revelations about the ancient pure-blood society and the mental expanse they showed him. Now he felt hopelessly silly and naive, with no sense of history and an enormous sense of how much he _didn't _know. Now he wondered how he could have been content to hide in the Ashborn's fortress and think about adding a few more details to the life of his child. Now he wondered whether Severus was the be-all and end-all of his life, and felt disloyal for thinking such things, and wondered why those thoughts had never come to him before.

_At least that proves that I'm not mind-controlled, the way Potter suspected I was. He wouldn't have left me these doubts._

Draco finally settled on a bench in a corner of the largest garden and looked up through the fine net of defensive wards to the sun above. It was a mostly cloudy day, but every now and then, a beam of light would break through as though the sun was trying to caress the flowers around Draco. Flowers, vines, bushes, straggling masses of leaves that counted as all of them...Severus had directed them to be planted as ingredients, not for their beauty. But they were beautiful anyway, and Draco breathed in the scents of the roses and thought about his mother.

She'd had a theory of "grace notes," things that weren't strictly necessary or expedient but which you did to show that you didn't _need _to count only what was necessary or expedient. You made your chairs comfortable. You made your walls beautiful. You had glass or ivory or gold in your home, not because such materials were the best for vases or tables or clocks, but because they showed that you wanted to give your guests something else to look at than plain stone. She had loved emeralds, which were probably the gemstone with the fewest magical uses to someone like his father.

She had never apologized for liking them. She had an emerald necklace and an emerald ring, and the evenings that Draco had seen her wearing them, her face had shone with a beauty that didn't just come from her joy at being admired. She had a joy in wearing them, simply and purely because she liked the color.

There was nothing in Draco's life that was like that. He had thought translating the book of runes was, but he had realized when he ran into the real description of the real, ancient pure-blood culture that he felt nothing but dismay, instead of the wonder and fascination he had thought he would. It was so _different. _He wanted something that he could use to apply towards the future, towards making his family different and better than any of the others.

The spirit of that culture was against anything of the sort. And he had felt dismay because now he could not _use _it, at least not in the way he'd dreamed of. Simply knowing wasn't enough.

Draco leaned his head back on the wall and half-closed his eyes. He could pretend to himself that it was because the sun was shining directly into his face, but he knew the real reason, and it made him shift restlessly on the bench.

Severus would never admit that he wanted or liked such things, that the pleasure he sought with Draco had any unnecessary or luxurious components to it. And the Ashborn were much the same, tools of Severus's necessities and those tasks he didn't want to take the time to accomplish himself.

There was only one person in the fortress who might understand the way he was thinking and encourage him to act on it.

Potter.

Draco climbed heavily to his feet and crossed the grassy walkway that would carry him back to the fortress. He wondered if Bellatrix would obey his command to leave them alone if he gave it. He couldn't be sure, because he had never tested such a thing. The times he gave a command that conflicted with Severus's and Severus had disliked it, Draco had apologized and reassured him that it only came from thoughtlessness, not any desire to contradict his leader.

That was no longer true.

Heart going faster than it should, throat dryer than it should be, Draco went to find Potter.

* * *

Malfoy wasn't in the library, or the corridors that Harry searched, or in the few rooms that Bellatrix would let him into-dining hall, what looked like a study, a large experimental potions lab-before she got agitated and stepped into his path. Harry sighed and turned around to retrace his steps. This was harder than he had reckoned. He had been so pleased when Snape and Malfoy left him alone, but that would mean that they'd avoid him even if he found them.

"Potter."

_There _was Malfoy, closing a massive wrought-iron gate behind him. Harry caught a glimpse of faint sunshine and smelled fresh air, and told himself to remember the gate, which led outside. He had been brought by Apparition to the inside of the Ashborn's fortress, so he still didn't have much of an idea what the whole thing looked like, but this added to his mental plans.

"I need to speak with you."

Harry blinked, hearing what sounded like an echo of his voice, and then realized that Malfoy had said it at the same time. He found himself smiling grimly back at Malfoy, who looked half-embarrassed, folding his arms as though that would provide a protective barrier against his emotions.

"Fine," Harry said. "Do you know a private place we can go?"

"Not private," said Bellatrix, and there was an echo in her voice that sounded more like the iron gate closing than any repeated words said by another.

"Ignore her," Malfoy said, with a light flush in his cheeks that Harry thought belied his words. "Severus has-changed her-so that she has to say things like that, but I'm high in his confidence."

_Keep telling yourself that, _Harry thought, but it might not be the right time to bring up Malfoy's own controlled mind, especially if Bellatrix could tell Snape what she heard. "All right. Then what?"

"Come to my rooms," Malfoy said, and led the way.

Harry blinked as he stepped into a room of sober magnificence, all grey and black and white and silver. Well, he reckoned Malfoy must actually like these colors, rather than being stuck with them because of the natural colors of the stone; he'd certainly had a chance to change them if he wanted. Harry looked around and took what seemed to be the smallest of the chairs. If Snape burst in, that would probably be the kind of thing that he'd read a great deal into.

Malfoy took the chair that faced him. Bellatrix stood by the door like an obedient dog. Malfoy glanced at her and licked his lips once before asking her to guard the door from intruders, and seemed surprised that she went. Harry was sure that the expression on his face wasn't hunger or any other kind of desire.

_Interesting. If he's uneasy that she might report something back to Snape, then perhaps he's thinking of rebellion on his own._

"Listen," Malfoy said, facing him. "How much do you know about pure-blood culture?"

_Well. That wasn't what I expected. _"That almost everyone who's interested in it tries to kill me," Harry said dryly. "If that's not what you're referring to, then I'll need you to tell me."

"It's not," Malfoy said. He bowed his head so that he was looking down at his hands, leaving Harry to study only his profile. It surprised him. From this angle, Malfoy could actually look like a serious, studious young man. It was probably an illusion, but it was still an image Harry had never thought he would see in Malfoy. "I-I've been translating a book of runes that hides the story of a culture my ancestors left behind. My Malfoy ancestors, and even my Black ones, it was a Black ancestor who wrote the book, wanted to have honors for only their own families. They turned against their allies. In the ancient times, they were allies with almost everyone, including families they think of as enemies today."

Harry held up his hand. "I'll need you to slow down a little. So there were some political alliances and they broke them. How is that different from the way that people act nowadays, allying with the Ministry or with Voldemort and then changing their minds?"

Malfoy's head snapped up, and the unfamiliar look to his face that had haunted Harry faded, replaced by the ordinary stubbornness he knew better. "Could you not _call _him that? I'll listen to any other name that you want to make up, even the ridiculous ones, but I don't like flinching when I'm trying to have a normal conversation with you."

Harry blinked. "Do you believe that he's still alive?" he asked. "That he could come back?"

Malfoy shook his head. "Of course not. Severus and I felt a change in our Dark Marks the night he died. If he was still alive, we would have been the first to know. I believe you destroyed him forever."

"Then-"

"The name is-too sharp a reminder of the war." Malfoy pushed his fringe out of his eyes. "We want to move forwards, to change things, or at least I do." Harry stared. That was more interesting than anything he'd expected to hear from Malfoy, that he might be interested in change in a different way from Snape. Malfoy turned his head to the side as if he'd realized that but went on speaking. "We don't want to forget the war, but we don't want to have a waking nightmare in the middle of the day, either."

Harry thought about that. It still sounded similar to what he suspected most people's attitudes would be now that he was a hostage: mourning at first, then forgetting as they pushed the war behind them in any way they could.

But most of those people had only been victims in the war, not fighters. Harry didn't see how the fighters _could _forget. And Malfoy had been not only Death Eater, but Voldemort's victim, in some intense, close, intertwining relationship that Harry didn't understand and didn't really want to understand.

"All right," he said. "I'll try to remember, but I can't promise that I'll do it all the time at first. And it doesn't mean that you won't snort at the ridiculous name I come up with to replace his title, either. I'm not going to call him the bloody Dark Lord."

Malfoy gave him a weak smile. "Thank you."

Harry nodded. "So, anyway. You were explaining to me how these old political alliances were different from the modern ones."

"Because they weren't just political," Malfoy said. He hesitated, then said, "Take marriage as one example. My parents raised me with the idea that marriage meant devotion, and children, and an exchange of money. They weren't opposed to the idea of me falling in love with my bride, but it was definitely a secondary consideration, because we could be legally tied together without that."

"Right," Harry said, hiding his distaste at the thought as well as he could.

He must not have hidden it well enough. Malfoy just raised an eyebrow at him, though, and went on. "The old pure-blood culture favored _multiple _alliances, and the main idea was the connection, the devotion, not just the reproduction of children or Galleons. You might marry someone you loved, and someone else your family thought would be a good match for you, and someone else who was more or less a business arrangement like the one my parents wanted me to make, and someone else you _had _to marry because otherwise you wouldn't have children, and someone you liked a lot but didn't love as much as the first partner."

Harry shivered a bit. He couldn't imagine that. Well, he reckoned it would be all right for people actually raised in that world, but he had always wanted devotion and one person to call his own.

He'd thought Ginny would be that person, but now...

Harry impatiently pushed the thought away. Well, he'd had his chance, and chosen this course instead. No need to squeal that he was put-upon and treated unfairly. "So what was the point of that?"

"To bind everyone together," Malfoy said. "You didn't change your alliances unless the other person betrayed you first, and if your interests came into conflict, people were supposed to negotiate and listen to one another and explain why they wanted what they wanted and suggest substitutes. It was-complex. But they had a lot fewer wars than we did, and no Dark Lords. No Dark Lord could arise without outraging his families and alienating them all, or without his families noticing something was wrong and stopping him in time."

Harry half-shook his head. "But if someone was selfish enough to become a Dark Lord in the first place, why would he care about that?"

Malfoy shrugged. "He might not-although I think the encouragement of his tendencies which something like my father's power-seeking could foster wouldn't happen there. But the main thing was that someone could see him and spot him in time."

Harry traced a finger along the edge of the cushion he sat on, and then stopped when he saw Malfoy staring at him. He was probably getting his dirty half-blood germs all over the chair, he thought wryly. "I hadn't thought about that," he said. "But if they were all bound together and didn't fight each other, then could they actually kill someone who betrayed the rest or tried to commit murder?"

Malfoy smiled coldly. "If someone committed betrayal of his own free will and not because he was pressured into it or taking a justified revenge, then they would find out. And they would kill him, yes."

"Justice couldn't always have worked out neatly," Harry said bitterly, thinking of Sirius. To this day, he didn't understand why they hadn't used Veritaserum to exonerate his godfather. It was possible Sirius had refused to take it, and the Ministry couldn't force him to drink it, but surely Dumbledore could have done something...

Then Harry sighed soundlessly through his nose. If the Pensieve of memories he had received from Dumbledore had proven anything, it was that the man wasn't faultless, and Harry and the others who had relied on him to that great an extent had been blind.

"Oh, I don't think it was," Malfoy said. "But it must have been a lot more common for them to find out the right answer, because they were _interested _in investigating it. They didn't dismiss it as a nuisance, the way we sometimes do the notion of fair trials in our society."

Harry shrugged. "I can imagine that it would be a better world, but I still don't really see what it has to do with me. You're remembering that I'm not pure-blood, right? That was one of the reasons that Old Eating-Grave-Dirt wanted to kill me in the first place. Not that he was pure himself, but, well, hypocrisy in Dark Lords, what are you going to do."

Malfoy stared at him in open shock. "He wasn't-"

Harry shook his head in amusement. "No. His mother was magical, but she fell in love with a Muggle. He grew up in an orphanage in the Muggle world, and didn't know who he was at first." Harry hid a shiver. That could have been his fate, in so many ways, if the Dursleys had been a little less willing to put up with him.

He wasn't grateful to his relatives, not exactly, but they had taught him how to survive and hadn't been as harsh to him as they could have been. For that, he would have to thank them, if he ever saw them again.

_Not bloody likely, here. _

Malfoy looked far more disturbed than Harry had thought possible. In fact, he ran a shaking hand through his hair and stared unseeingly at the far wall of his room. Harry stifled the temptation to invite Malfoy to his own rooms, to see the images and that people could live in other ways than just with "pure" colors. He didn't think Malfoy was in the mood to take that kind of invitation well.

"I never knew," Malfoy whispered. "That wasn't the sort of thing that anyone talked about. Or hinted about."

"Well, they wouldn't have wanted to, with Vol-No-Nose poised to destroy them if he heard," Harry said logically. Then he leaned forwards. He still hadn't had a chance to talk to Malfoy about what he was really most concerned about, the Ashborn and the level of free will they had, but on the other hand, maybe he could turn the conversation in that direction if he worked at it. "You haven't answered my question. Why should it matter to me what ancient pure-blood culture was like? If you're maintaining the old distinctions, then it's the same to me whether people who hate me are allied or squabbling. Squabbling might be even better, in fact."

* * *

Someone had stolen Potter during the night and replaced him with one of Severus's automatons, Draco thought faintly. That was the only possible reason he could be making as much sense as he was.

But a sensible Potter was one who awaited an answer, and Draco knew that he couldn't put off the real purpose of the conversation any longer, as he had tried to by talking about his discoveries. Well, that and he had wanted someone who would share his excitement. But he should have known Potter wouldn't.

"I...I think that you can help me with Severus," he said. Those weren't the right ones, either, but they might do for a beginning.

Potter's eyebrows shot up. "Malfoy, no offense, but what you do in the bedroom is none of my business."

"Not _that_," Draco said, a little disgusted that Potter would even think of it. _Severus would never consent to fuck him. _"I meant that Severus isn't as strong and capable as he could be."

Potter gazed blankly back at him. "And this is my problem how?"

Draco stood up to pace. It was an indulgence that he tried not to exercise in front of Severus, who was so quiet himself that he thought one should be able to sit in a chair and think through all the thoughts in one's head. But Potter either wouldn't share the same standards or wouldn't really care, since he didn't have a high opinion of Draco in the first place. "I'd think you would care," he said. "Since you're living in the same fortress now, and his mood can directly affect your quality of life."

"If he uses _Crucio _on me, I'll do it right back," Potter said, with what Draco thought amazing coolness considering the way Severus had dueled him to a standstill three years ago. "Besides that, I don't see how he could affect me."

Draco shook his head in slow wonder. He stood on one side of an abyss, and Potter stood on the other. Draco would have considered it _vitally _important to understand Potter's moods and what caused them if the situation was reversed and he was a prisoner among Potter's people. Anything that made Potter upset might be laid at Draco's feet; anything that made him happy, as long as Draco could do it in return, might mean that he could gain more power and move up the hierarchy to a place at Potter's side. But Potter still saw himself as a kind of isolated island, not bound to the people around him just because he had joined them by force.

The way that Draco's father had seen himself. Potter's haughty, lion-like walk among his enemies reminded Draco of that, the way his mother had said Lucius reacted when he was briefly imprisoned after the first war.

The way that Draco knew now to be wrong and weaker than that old way where they all depended on each other.

_Then I have to be the one to build the bridge across the abyss and show Potter why this matters. What does he care aboutt? _

Once he asked himself the question, the answer wasn't far away, and Draco was a bit humiliated he had missed it before. He lowered his voice and asked, "Even if the way he acts-the way he acts _because _of you-influences how someone else is treated?"

Potter sat up, and now that haughty, stalking lion had turned its attention on Draco and expected him to have something good enough to pay it back. Draco was elated and terrified at the same time. He couldn't remember feeling this way before, except the first few times Severus had taken him to bed, before it became routine.

_And I didn't know it was routine until now. _

Potter seemed to be in the habit of teaching him uncomfortable things about himself. Draco struck out stoutly for higher ground, deciding that he could ignore some of those weaker insights for now. "If he mistreats one of the Ashborn because he's angry, for example. Or me. He won't strike at you because of the Vow you swore. That doesn't mean that someone else won't suffer. Severus grew excellent at deflecting his anger when he served the Dark Lord. Everyone did. You didn't get angry at _him_, you just assured that someone else lower in the hierarchy suffered your displeasure." Draco shivered as he remembered the way his aunt used to do that, though in her case she was mainly taking out disappointment that the Dark Lord hadn't noticed her that day, or had favored someone else. One of the happiest moments of his life had been the one when he realized Bellatrix was tamed and wouldn't hurt him again.

Potter sat still, then shook his head. "If your advice to me is to placate him, then I don't think it'll work. We've always argued, long before I understood why he hated me. The most I'll do is try to keep his anger focused on me in ways that will flow over in barbs to me and not to someone else."

Draco sighed and sat down on the bed. He was a bit closer to Potter, who tensed and watched him. Draco wondered about that. How often had Potter fought in the war? Sometimes he seemed like his old, annoying self with a few quirks that made it hard to discuss things rationally with him, and then he would watch you move or seem to mark the exits from a room and his eyes would flare with something primal, something powerful.

It was the kind of thing that had drawn Draco to Severus, but he didn't think Potter would be safe to touch. Potter had never had any of the reasons that Severus did to tolerate or be fond of him.

"You could do more than that," Draco said. "You said you wanted to study, that you wanted to _do _something. There's enough material in these books that I'm translating to give you a project for a lifetime. And if Severus saw that you were integrating yourself into our group, then he might calm down. That would mean less trauma for the Ashborn, for all of us." _And it would give me time to figure out in what ways I'm independent of Severus, and in what ways I'm obeying him just like everyone else._

Potter watched him with quiet, troubled eyes. Then he said, "It's more than that. Did you-figure out that he's been controlling you, now?"

The audacity took Draco's breath away, and he responded before he thought about it, his voice poised to cut like a knife. "I'm _not _being controlled. If I was, then I couldn't have doubts, could I?"

"So you _do _have doubts."

Draco would have tried to kill him if he had said that in a satisfied voice. But he said it with a breathlessness instead, a shining satisfaction in his tone that made Draco pause and think. Potter leaned forwards on his chair and spoke softly, intensely, the hair on the back of Draco's neck crawling with his words.

"I hate the way they look, going about their lives with dead eyes. I want to _do _something for them, and for you, but I don't know what I can do, without violating my oath. It's not right that they're treated like that, but I can't act directly against Snape, and trying to talk to them will just make them report what I'm doing. You're my one chance to save everyone, my one wedge into them."

"So we want to use each other," Draco said, and didn't even care about the wry tone in his voice or what he had just revealed. He was still too stunned by the revelation that he and Potter could have common ground, after all. "That's fine."

"How do you want to use me?"

Potter didn't sound hostile, as though he was _interested _in what Draco was going to do. Draco met his eyes directly. "You made me aware of some things about Severus I would rather not have thought," he said. "I want to explore that further, to figure out why you make me think those things and what I should do about them if they're true."

Potter gave him a long, slow, curious look. It was as though he thought Draco might turn out to be extremely intelligent or extremely stupid, but he didn't know which at that particular moment. "You already said that you know you're free. What else can I help you learn?"

"I'm free, but I've followed Severus like the rest of them," Draco said. He had to look aside into the fire as he spoke. Meeting Potter's eyes as he confessed his weaknesses was still too damning, still too daunting. "Blindly. Adoringly. He didn't _need _to control me, he had everything he could want from me without that." His voice rasped with bitterness. He controlled it with a long, careful snort. "I want to know how much of that is necessary and how much isn't."

"None of it's necessary."

Draco shook his head. "You're here against your will, but I chose this. And you could go back to your friends if Severus died tomorrow, but I have nowhere else to go. My parents are dead. My friends don't acknowledge me." Actually, that was the closest he could get to the utter blankness, the utter abyss, he felt between himself and his former friends. He hadn't seen them in three years, hadn't heard from them, barely knew how the war had gone for them aside from seeing a few of their parents die or be arrested. But he was older than they were, full of ashes they hadn't eaten. "I bear Severus's Mark. I have to survive where I am, but I want to do it as my own person. That's how we're different." He was relieved there was still _something_.

"His Mark."

Potter's voice had gone flat. _Wonderful. _Draco shot Potter another look, but he didn't know what was in it, what fury and anger and unhealed wounds. "He changed the Dark Mark to one that signified loyalty to him. What, would you have expected him to leave things exactly the same? It wasn't possible. The old Mark was a tie to the Dark Lord, and would have tugged at the Ashborn even though he's dead. He changed their Marks for the same reason he changed their name."

"Let me see it."

Draco shook his head. "Why? You'll only sneer at it, and you've inflicted enough upheaval in my life in the last few days."

Potter looked at him with flat, steady eyes. "Because I need to," he said simply. "Because some of the things you've told me don't make any sense without that, and I need to see it for myself."

Draco snorted. "Of course. You'll change your mind the instant you see it. You probably already have, and decided that all of the Ashborn are unworthy of the freedom you talked about giving them, because we still carry a Mark on our skin. It wasn't _going away, _Potter. It was transform it or nothing."

"I know that," Potter said, and his hand rose and covered the scar on his forehead, which Draco hadn't looked at it in days. It was different here than when Potter was prancing around the school, drawing attention to himself. "But-I know what my scar looks like, now, how it's faded. Let me see this one, and I think that I can take it as a literal sign of the change that you're talking about."

Draco hesitated one last time. Only a few days ago, he had decided that Potter would never be worthy to see his Mark.

But now...

Now, things had changed, and having Potter's help would make gaining control over his slide into chaos a lot easier. Draco pulled back his left sleeve and turned his arm, keeping his gaze on the fire.

* * *

Harry knew what the Dark Mark looked like. He had spent almost an entire day lying in the snow, trapped beneath the body of a Death Eater, staring at it, before Ron and Hermione found him.

But this was different, in the ways that Malfoy had promised. It covered a larger area, for one thing, as though simply replacing Voldemort's snake and skull hadn't been enough for Snape. He had to tear up innocent skin.

Harry's vision hazed red. He knew that was a danger sign. He took a few breaths and went on watching the Mark in a kind of detached way, cataloging details in his mind that he would think about later.

The symbol was a black bird, stretching its wings towards the cardinal points of east and west. Its beak was open, and from the cruel, jagged shape of it, as well as the talons that stretched away under its body, Harry knew it was probably supposed to be an eagle. Faint lines danced away from the beak. Harry leaned towards them, and made out tongues of fire there.

"What, Snape couldn't decide between a bird and a dragon?" he muttered.

"We rose from the ashes," Malfoy said, his voice stiff with knotted pride. "It's only appropriate that we have fire as part of the symbol."

Harry nodded, and kept on looking. The bird's feathers were mostly an undifferentiated mass of sleek black against the body, but stood out on the spread wings and in what was nearly a crest on the lifted head. The talons hooked; loving detail had been spent on the claws. Beneath the claws lay something Harry had thought was a tree branch at first but which resolved into an outflung arm when he looked at it. That was another thing he was familiar with from his sojourn in the snow, pinned beneath a corpse that smelled worse hour after hour.

But he wasn't there now. He was in a warm room with someone who had taken a risk in showing him the Mark; that much was obvious from the fine tremor that swarmed through Malfoy's arm as he held it out. Harry leaned back and gestured. "All right, enough," he said, when Malfoy glared at him. "I don't have to see anymore. You're right, it is different from the Dark Mark."

Malfoy drew his sleeve back down, but kept his hand hovering protectively, as though to cover the bird. Harry looked at him, trying to understand, trying to see inside his head.

This mattered to Malfoy, even when he sounded on the verge of questioning Snape and abandoning his old ways. Why?

_Because it made him part of something. Because it took away the symbol of shame and slavery he was carrying up until that point, and made him part of something special. _Harry knew the answer as clearly as though Malfoy had shouted it into his ear.

And really, _didn't _it make sense? Snape hadn't rescued Malfoy in the traditional way, but he had hammered the remnants of the Death Eaters into an elite fighting force and given Malfoy a high place among them. It had been what Malfoy probably thought would happen to him at first with Voldemort, but more stable and longer-lasting.

Snape was fulfilling a lot of Malfoy's fantasies, really.

Harry glanced at Malfoy, decided it would be smarter if he didn't say _that _directly to Malfoy's face, and instead asked, "So what does that mean, for you? That there's a way for the Ashborn to be fundamentally different from the Death Eaters? Are you going to make them that way, with the book that you told me you're translating and your notions of what pure-blood culture used to be like?"

He hadn't meant the words to come out in an accusatory tone, but Malfoy flushed and glared at him. "You needn't sound as though _you _have some grand ambitions that are going unfulfilled," he said. "Or you would never have agreed to come with us and be a hostage in the first place."

Harry tried to smile, but he knew it came out bitter. He shook his head. "I put my life on hold because I thought it was worth it," he said. "But I _was _under the impression that Snape had some ambition for the Ashborn. They're powerful, and they're organized, and he showed himself willing to go to war for it. And he's a Slytherin. But what can he possibly have them do?"

Malfoy hesitated. Harry waited, trying to keep his eyes from flitting back to Malfoy's left sleeve and the Mark that it covered. He wanted to take another look at it, to see if he could discern anything about Snape's intentions from it. As he had learned from an intense study of clues and asking questions of those who'd known Tom Riddle, even a careful Dark Lord couldn't always keep from betraying himself.

_That skill would have been useful to me if I was an Auror._

Harry shrugged the self-pity off. That was another life, the one he wouldn't have. But it seemed he would have to wait for Malfoy to tell him what his life _would _be like.

* * *

Draco would have liked to spend a few minutes with his eyes closed in meditation. Severus had taught him that even a short time when one wouldn't permit oneself to think about anything else could do wonders for the concentration. And this conundrum needed either concentration or a wiser head than sat on his shoulders.

_A head like the one on Severus's? The head that you used to think was so knowledgeable, and which you trusted to think for you?_

Draco swallowed. Yes, he could have used some time alone, but he wasn't getting it. He doubted that this Potter, the one with the glance like broken glass and the intelligence that he had been hiding somewhere, would agree to retreat or politely look elsewhere while Draco thought about matters that involved the two of them.

"Fine," he said at last, and tore something open in himself as he did so. "I think that Severus really wants a private world where he can brew and experiment, and nothing else. He doesn't want anything to disrupt that, though, so he has to have a strong set of guards who will keep him safe from any interference."

There was a pause that felt breathless to Draco. Potter had frozen, one hand closed on the edge of his chair. He stared into the fire the way that Draco had on the evenings-most of them-when Severus refused to join him, and then he bared his teeth.

"What?" he breathed. "Their minds, their lives, their sanity, their freedom, sacrificed to _that_?"

"Well, Bellatrix didn't have much sanity to begin with," Draco felt compelled to point out.

Potter sprang to his feet. Draco grabbed his wand by instinct, but it was Potter's idea to pace back and forth, spitting epithets. Draco hadn't heard most of them, or else they were in a different language. He watched and listened, in silence, until Potter ran down and turned to him.

"That's not right," Potter said simply. "He told me not to foment rebellion among the Ashborn."

Draco nodded cautiously. "Which means most of the things that you probably want to do are right out."

"I know that." Potter roasted Draco with a glance. "But you don't have any such restrictions on you. And as long as we leave a set of guards who can protect him-preferably the ones, like Bellatrix, who would be no good even if we did break them free-then you and I can do something else."

"Neither of us is good enough at Legilimency to free them from their bindings," Draco said.

Potter looked briefly disappointed, which meant he had hoped Draco was good enough, which meant-Draco didn't know. He was unused to having people trust him to be good at things, now.

"I know," Potter said then, which was truth in the purest sense of the word; he _did _know, now. "But there are other things we can do. If Snape saw that we were doing something that would rebound to his benefit, he would give us some slack to do it in, right?"

"Perhaps," Draco said. "I think that he wants a completely undisturbed, unchanging life." Which, judging by Potter's look of withering contempt, sounded far worse aloud than it had in his head when he whispered to himself what Severus wanted and what he must therefore try to do.

"Fine," Potter said, though in a tone that clearly promised a return to the subject later. "For now, we'll see what we can do with your notion of pure-blood culture, and that means reaching out."

"To the Ashborn? That's useless."

"No." Potter smiled, and Draco felt a rush of something pass through him that was like the thrill he had felt when he saw a dragon flying once in the distance. "To other allies."

* * *

Severus lifted his head from contemplating the snake automaton, still motionless despite all the effort he had spent on it.

He had felt...

He had felt a wind pass through his head, as though one of the Ashborn was breaking free of the web of control he had spun about them. But when he reached out and tested their positions through light touches to their Marks, knotted inside his head, he felt nothing missing. Everyone was in place.

And the wards would have alerted him if Potter had tried to escape. Not to mention that the brat would be dying now of breaking his Unbreakable Vow.

Severus frowned, shook his head, and returned to consideration of his problem, one of the challenges that made life worth living.


	5. Call the Charge

Thank you again for all the reviews!

_Chapter Five-Call the Charge_

The white raven came back the next day.

Harry made sure to keep his head down, as if he didn't notice it, when he stepped into the small, grassy courtyard where Bellatrix took him to exercise. He did his usual running, his cycling motions, and his stretches. All the while, he watched from the corner of his eye for the raven to give some sign. He didn't think Bellatrix would be content simply to look at him and not the surroundings for long.

But the raven did nothing until Bellatrix glanced up and noticed it. Then she jerked her wand up with a mutter that briefly twisted her face into something like the horrible, grinning mask Harry was used to seeing in his nightmares about Sirius. He took an involuntary step back, closer to the bird.

The raven hopped towards him as if it would step onto his shoulder.

Bellatrix shrieked and let fly a spell that made Harry wince and duck, although he did think briefly about standing still so that it would scorch him and he could claim he'd acted in self-defense. The curse had too much magic for that, though, and the raven also screeched and lifted above it, the wide wings cutting the air in ghostly swathes.

As it flew, two things fell at Harry's feet: a single pure white feather and a folded scrap of parchment. He snatched both up and then turned and frowned at Bellatrix, whose face was rippling as she struggled to comprehend the fact that she had almost hurt him.

"I did not," she said, and then stopped, as though even the obvious lack of blood on his body couldn't completely redeem her action.

Because Harry agreed, he let his frown go. "But you almost did," he said, and turned as if he would march out of the courtyard. When he looked again from the corner of his eye, the raven was completely gone, he couldn't be sure where.

"It dropped something," Bellatrix said, remembering her true loyalty faster than Harry had wanted her to. "Let me see it."

Harry rolled his eyes, sighed resignedly, and passed over the feather. "I think you did wound the raven," he said, tucking the note into a pocket so deep that Bellatrix could run her wand all over his body looking for something touched by magical creatures and never find it. Harry had spent an instructive hour altering his clothes the other evening, after it occurred to him that his conversation with Malfoy meant he'd probably be carrying more secrets around.

"Good," Bellatrix said, absently, and then stared into his eyes. "You swear this is all?"

Harry shrugged and nodded. "The raven didn't mean to stick around and see what would happen after you hit it," he said, which was true but mainly a distraction.

As he had suspected it would, that made Bellatrix strut and talk about the commendation she would receive from Snape. Harry kept himself from touching the note as they walked into the fortress, but he wanted to. He was privately impressed by his unknown allies' foresight and discretion; they had known that he'd need something to hand to Bellatrix in lieu of the message. Or else the raven had been smart enough to figure that out for itself and detach a feather.

He wasn't sure which one would comfort him more, actually, and he tried to keep from thinking about it too much until he was alone and could examine the note. That happened when Bellatrix thought she heard someone in the corridor and charged out to confront them. Harry hastily unfolded the parchment and read it with his hand cupped around it, so that Bellatrix wouldn't see it right away even if she came back inside.

_You are the one who can restore our old alliances. Open your mind tonight when you dream._

That was all. Harry stared at it, then turned it over in case there was anything written on the back, and whispered a few charms that should reveal invisible writing. Nothing. He crumpled it up and tucked it under his pillow, frowning, as Bellatrix swept back in.

"Someone deviated from the path," she announced, as though that should mean something to Harry. "My Lord Commander will not be pleased."

Harry made vague encouraging noises that should let her think he was more interested in the internal affairs of the Ashborn than he really was, and wondered. _What does opening my mind in my dreams mean? Is that like clearing my mind? _

_If so, then any rebellion I might start is fucked. _He was no better at Occlumency after three years on the run than he had ever been.

He wondered if he dared trust Malfoy with the letter, and then grimaced. He had to, because if there were any clues there that he might miss, if Malfoy knew what the obscure references meant, then Harry had to take advantage of his knowledge. His "allies" would probably back away if they tried to get into Harry's dreams and found the way blocked.

_And, strange as it seems, he's the only one I trust to tell me if this is too dangerous to try._

Bellatrix talked on and on about the glories of the Ashborn, and Harry paid little attention. Under normal circumstances, he might have thought it was useful information, but Bellatrix thought only what Snape told her to think. And underneath that was her scary, twisted loyalty, which Harry reckoned Snape had built on the remains of her loyalty to Voldemort. No, it was for the best if he concerned himself with his own affairs first, and left Bellatrix to get on with things.

_I'll go to Malfoy as soon as I can._

Bellatrix finally ran down what felt like mid-morning, and Harry adopted a serious expression and sat up. "I should go to the library," he said. "And can you go and fetch Lord Malfoy for me?"

Bellatrix blinked. "Why?" she asked at last, sounding triumphant that she had come up with the word. She probably should feel that way, Harry decided with pity, given how short a leash Snape kept her on.

"Because I want to learn more about the Ashborn," Harry told her earnestly. "And there are history books in the library. I can compare them with other groups and learn all about them. And I can learn how much better Lord Snape made you than all the others."

Bellatrix lifted her head and seemed to inhale. At least, she seemed as if she would float right off the ground. "Then you shall learn," she said, and motioned impatiently for Harry to stand up and follow her, as though she thought he was losing out by not knowing right now. Harry followed meekly, holding his breath. It had been too simple. She would probably stop at Snape's lab on the way and tell him about Harry's genius plan, and Snape would forbid him to go anywhere near the library.

But that didn't happen. Instead, Bellatrix dumped him among the unorganized books and then went to fetch Malfoy. Harry tried to browse the histories to make his lies truth in case any of the other Ashborn came in and found him there, but his throat and muscles were all too tight.

_I have to know. This could be the most important thing I'll ever do here, the only chance I have at a normal life._

Then Harry paused and snorted. A normal life? By whose standards? He had promised never to escape and never to raise his wand against the Ashborn except in self-defense, as well as not stirring up rebellion. No matter what he did here, he didn't think normal really factored into it. And the life he had lived so far, the life of war and running and betrayal and fighting Voldemort, was behind him now, no matter what he decided.

He'd learned to laugh at himself in the war, and it had proven a useful skill. It proved useful again now, as he wandered among the books and picked a few for reading later. When Malfoy arrived, Harry was able to turn around and smile almost normally.

Until he saw the state of Malfoy's face, at least. He looked as if he would faint, or possibly collapse of heat stroke. Harry rushed forwards to draw a chair out from the table, and to cast a Cooling Charm. "What happened?" he asked.

* * *

If Draco had been content to conduct his amusements in such a way that they did not trouble Severus, Severus could easily have forgiven him. But instead, Draco was abstracted and frowning at dinner that night, and then he brushed Severus off when Severus issued a clear invitation back to their shared rooms. He was so casual about it that he did not seem to notice he did it. He was trotting down the corridor towards his meditation rooms before Severus could react.

He did react, of course, and he did not raise his voice. The Ashborn owed allegiance to him, but in some cases it was a coiling, fanatical thing, and they might attack Draco at his shout before he could stop them. "Come back here, Draco."

Draco stopped, no doubt feeling the bite of Severus's displeasure through his Mark. That had been a consequence, and a regrettable one, of Marking Draco first. But he had asked so sweetly, and with such a trembling eagerness in his voice, that Severus had not been able to resist, and had altered the Dark Mark before he had fully studied the spells that made it serve their former Lord. When he had enchanted Bellatrix and the rest, he had studied longer and been more careful.

"Yes, Severus?" Draco turned around. He had his head half-lowered, his voice soft in a way that Severus did not like any more than he had liked the way Draco ignored him. It said that Draco resented the attention he had to pay to Severus, and as Severus had never asked for much from him, he resented, in turn, the implication.

"I wish you to come to me tonight," Severus said. It was not his way to ask so bluntly; most of the time, it was Draco who did the asking. But this was a different situation than normal. He did not know what preoccupied Draco, and he did not care. He knew only what he wanted.

Draco clenched his teeth as though on a retort, and bowed his head further. "Of course, Severus," he murmured. "If you wish to make space for me in your bed, then I'll be happy to do so."

He was not happy to do so. Every bristling line of his body said that. But if he was ill, Severus would have noted it, and if something had happened to distress Draco, one of the Ashborn would have reported it to him. So Severus took Draco's arm in a strong grip and pulled him along to their rooms.

There was no fire lit when they arrived, as Severus did not believe in wasting fuel when no one was there, but he waved his wand and created a large one in seconds. He turned to Draco, who ordinarily would have started stripping by now, or at least be watching him with large eyes, all but trembling in his eagerness. Instead, Draco had his hands locked on the edges of his robe collar and his eyes locked on the fire.

"Tell me what is wrong."

Draco jumped when he said that, and turned to face him. He shook his head. "I've been thinking about the book I was translating," he said. "Ancient pure-blood culture was so different from anything I expected that I'm not sure we could adapt it to a group like the Ashborn."

"Ah," Severus said, relieved. "I had thought it something important."

Draco hunched as though Severus had stabbed him, and nodded. "No," he said. "It doesn't have to do with potions or the safety of the Ashborn." He began to strip, although he still did it differently than usual, keeping his eyes on the fire as though he could not bear the sight of Severus waiting for him.

Severus reached out and caught his wrist, grinding on the delicate bones in it until Draco winced and paid attention to him. "If you do not come to my bed of your own free will," he said, "I do not wish you to come at all."

Draco sighed, a sigh that seemed to warble along on frequencies and tones that Severus had never heard from him and did not know why Draco should voice now. "It's not that," he said. "Not exactly." He hesitated, then blurted, "Severus, what do you see the Ashborn being like five years from now?"

"Five years." Severus considered the question, because there was weight behind it that he was unused to dealing with from Draco, and he knew it. But he did not know what the weight was, and that made it impossible for him to consider the question _exactly _as Draco would have him consider it. "I see several new potions perfected and in the outside world, under my name. I see our enemies using those potions, never knowing that they have me to depend on for the supply. If anyone ever moves against us, then I shall enjoy cutting it off and telling them the truth."

Draco's smile was too brief for the joke. "And where do you see me?"

"With several books translated, and with a child to raise, if your negotiation for a contract marriage with the old pure-blood lines goes well," Severus said. He thought he might see into the heart of Draco's discomfort then, and he shook his head. "Did you think I would forbid you my bed if you lay down with a woman for the sake of getting a child? Of course not. You have a pure-blood line to preserve. I do not." He had shared the story of his shameful heritage with Draco in the days immediately after fleeing to the Dark Lord. It was not a time that encouraged secrets taken to the grave, other than the great secret of why he had actually killed Dumbledore.

And the secret of his love for Lily, which he had never surrendered to anyone who was still alive.

"That's not it," Draco said again. "Not exactly." He faced Severus, and there was that old quivering eagerness in his eyes, though, since it was not directed towards him at the moment, Severus thought he had the right to be impatient with it. "I just-I want to have a grander vision. I want to do something else."

"Establish this old pure-blood society?" Severus shrugged. "I will not forbid you contact with the pure-blood families who still follow the older ways, like the circle of them you have discovered. I will even spare you a guard of Ashborn to travel to and fro from them as you like."

Draco ducked his head, so that his sleek fringe hid his eyes. It was a habit that Severus had disapproved of even when he was a child and doing it himself, and he opened his mouth to correct Draco, but Draco whispered, "What about the Ashborn? What will they be doing in five years?'

"Going about their routines," Severus said. "As always. I shall not let my control over them slip."

Draco's hands closed into fists inside his sleeves. This was it at last, Severus sensed, the source and origin of his new discomfort. He sat up and prepared to pay careful attention. Draco had always seemed supportive of his plans for the Ashborn. Severus was not sure why that would have changed, unless Draco had started yearning to command armies of his own-something their truce with Potter's faction would make impossible in any case.

_Or perhaps Potter has changed him._

That thought did not please Severus at all. He would have to start keeping a stricter eye on Potter's movements. Perhaps he should follow his original plan, before it had occurred to him that Unbreakable Vows on Potter and taking him as a hostage would keep Potter's friends quiet as well, and simply keep him drugged with the Draught of Living Death. Then he would be out of the way as a temptation either for Draco or for someone who wanted a living figurehead to follow.

"I want-something more," Draco said again. "And the Ashborn...wouldn't they be more _interesting _if they were something more, too? If they had their own desires and dreams and ambitions?" He raised his head and sought Severus's eyes, as if fearful of what he would find there.

He should have been. Draco had learned his lessons better than this, or at least so Severus thought. It was long moments before he could unclench his teeth and speak with less than a scornful whip in his voice. "So you would have me resurrect the Death Eaters again? All wizards scrambling for some gain or edge or goal of their own? You would have me play host to murderers, to those who would not see the virtue of the Unbreakable Vows that I made, who might well push me to break them so that I would die? You desire my death?"

Draco winced and said, "No. No, of course not, Severus!"

"Then explain to me what you mean." Severus's voice was softer now than it had been, but that took some effort. He still had to work some of the sharpness out of it before Draco would stop cowering before him. "You have hinted at vague dissatisfaction, and the only thing you would ask of me is out of the question, which you _must _have known before you asked for it. Why would you ask for it?"

Draco's face was white to the lips, and he licked them, quickly, ineffectually. Severus sneered at him. He had not thought that the mere promise of his anger was enough to reduce Draco to such whimpering cowardice, but apparently it was. If Potter was corrupting Draco, he had not done so by teaching him Gryffindor ideals of courage.

"I didn't know that you would respond like this," Draco said. "It's a discussion we never had before. I honestly didn't know, Severus, and I'm sorry if I angered you." He turned away, looking down. "Would you prefer that I go?"

Severus almost agreed. He was in no mood for fucking when he was like this, and Draco could use the time alone to think about what he had done.

But time alone had produced this defiance. That, Severus did not want to see and taste more of. His hand reached out of what seemed its own free will, and he caught Draco and pulled him closer.

"No," he whispered into Draco's mouth, opening in a gasp beneath his. "I would rather that you _stay_, and show me the depth of your regret." His hand moved down Draco's body and found his cock, straining, eager, ready. Draco could never hide the desires of his body, no matter how he tried. "Are you ready to give me that obedience, at least?"

Draco closed his eyes, and did.

It was different from the way he had shown his obedience before. Severus knew that; he was neither stupid nor prone to ignoring the reality that was in front of him. But it was enough like what he was used to that he did not push Draco from the bed until it was done, and they were both aching and covered with the ineffective spatter from Draco's cock. Draco slid to the floor, boneless, and lay there with his head lowered, his shoulders shaking as if he would weep.

Severus turned away. He found such weakness disgusting. "Go," he said.

Draco seized his robe and left. Severus lay there, staring at the ceiling and wondering how close an eye he should keep on Potter, and only later realized that he had sent Draco away from their shared rooms, something he had never done before. These rooms were neutral ground, their reason for being to give them both a place where they would be comfortable.

But Draco should not have accepted his dismissal the way he had. If he had protested, then Severus would have listened.

He would simply not accept the ridiculous way that Draco wanted to go about changing the future of the Ashborn.

Severus grunted and closed his eyes. He would worry about it in the morning, if it was still a problem by then. He could hope that Draco, who leaped on and off his preoccupations and interests like a flea from a dog's back, would have forgotten about this and be thinking about some new way to distill the Draught of Living Death.

_No, perhaps I cannot hope for that, after all. That would be useful, and he is not._

* * *

"He raped you, then."

Draco jolted. He had told the whole sorry story of the night before to Potter, and then sat in silence after that, staring at the tumbling ranks of the library books and wondering if he should have confessed anything to his worst enemy, let alone something that could hurt him so badly. He turned around now, shaking his head, but Potter was on his feet, pacing back and forth, and didn't seem to notice.

"He raped you," Potter repeated, and spun back around, his face brilliant with a fury that reminded Draco of lightning. "I'm going to figure out a way to kill him. There must be a hole, somewhere, in the Unbreakable Vow. Not even Snape can think of everything."

"He didn't rape me," Draco said quietly. He did want Potter's help against Severus, to make sure that Severus could never humiliate him that way again and to _prove _that he was valuable, but he could not have it if they started off with false conceptions. "I came willingly to his bed."

"If you had, you wouldn't have that expression on your face right now," Potter retorted, and took a few swift steps towards him, resting his hands on the back of Draco's chair. His expression was tender, fierce. "Don't you see...this is a sign that he has commands implanted in your brain, after all. Why else would you feel so awful about it but believe that you went willingly?"

"Oh, fuck off," Draco snapped, sitting up and sending Potter's hands flying. It was a relief to find that he could be angry at someone besides Severus, especially because he hadn't been certain that was true at first. "Yeah, he's a bastard, but I could have left. I went, in the end, because I liked the idea that he might find me important enough to fuck. That's the way I matter to him, and I want to increase it."

Potter stared at him. Draco stared back. "I told you," he said. "This is the way I am. What Severus thinks and does affects everyone here. I'm going to make sure it affects me in _good _ways. You're fine to play the hero and to pretend that you're above it all, but I don't have that luxury."

Potter looked as though he was struggling with that. Draco folded his arms and waited, breathing hard. Part of him was close to a panic at the thought that he was sending away his only ally against Severus and the mess that the Ashborn had become, but the rest of him was cold and tense as humming steel. He _wouldn't_ subject himself to the same trap he was just now escaping, again. He wouldn't become so desperate for Potter's approval that he worked against himself to get it.

_Strange, _he did think, _that working against myself with Severus involves telling the truth, but working against myself with Potter is lying._

* * *

_You always did jump to conclusions too fast, Harry._

That was Hermione's voice in his head, and Harry nodded and grimaced in acknowledgment. All right, so he had gone too far in assuming that Snape had raped Malfoy. It had been stupid, and he would apologize.

But seriously, Malfoy must have no idea what his face looked like, what his voice _sounded _like when he told the story. He had turned away as if in a horror, and Harry had held himself back because he wanted to hear the rest of it, but what he had desired the most at that moment was ripping Snape apart with his bare hands.

"Fine," he said at last. "Sorry. I-shouldn't have thought that, or at least shouldn't have let you see that I thought it."

Malfoy relaxed back in his chair, his eyes glinting oddly. "So you can be taught, as far as lies go," he said.

Harry shrugged. "I'm still not very good at them. Most of the time," he amended, thinking of the way he had managed to fool Snape the other day. He took the message the white raven had brought out of his pocket and took the other seat across from Malfoy. "I received this today. I don't know what it means. If it's talking about Occlumency, we're in deep shit, because I can't do it."

Malfoy read it, his brow creasing. Then he shook his head. "Occlumency is closing your mind to outside invasion," he said. "This talks about opening your mind. Inviting someone in." He eyed Harry over the top of the note. "That ought to be playing to your strengths."

Harry snorted, but didn't take the bait. He was still a bit shaken from their argument, both the intensity of his own fury and the fact that he'd got that upset over _Malfoy _of all people. "Fine. But how do I do it? Just going to bed thinking of them, whoever they are, won't do it."

Malfoy sighed. "The ones who are sending the bird are centaurs. Would it help to think of them?"

"I don't know," Harry said, conquering, hard, the temptation to throw something. "That's what I'm asking you."

Malfoy made a small, frustrated sound. "It's nothing special, Potter. That's why they sent no instructions, they just assumed that you'd know how to do it. All you have to do is think of centaurs, or magical creatures in general, strongly as you're falling asleep. That's the way to invite them inside."

Harry shook his head. "Does that work with any magical creatures?"

"It should, yes." Malfoy continued to look at him as though he was insisting on discussing whether the ground existed.

"Then why did it never work with the Dementors?" Harry asked grimly. "I know for sure that plenty of people were thinking of them when they surrounded the school in third year, and they had nightmares, but I never heard anyone had invited them into their minds."

* * *

Draco blinked, impressed. That was another feat of reasoning that he hadn't thought a Potter would be able to come up with.

"Because centaurs are beings," he said. "Dementors are-too mindless, too absorbed in themselves, to enter someone's mind that way." He found himself a little helpless to explain further than that, especially with Potter giving him such a skeptical look. Had the git really never learned this? "It's the basis of the beast-being distinction, Potter, although that's got more than a bit obscure over the years. Beings are the ones who can speak to you across the distance if you want it badly enough. Most wizards don't. Beasts are the ones who are either too narcissistic or too low in intelligence to do that."

Potter smiled grimly. "All right. How can I tell a mere dream about centaurs from actually speaking to them?"

"I'd assume based on what they tell you," Draco said, and settled back in his chair. This was easy, easier than he'd expected, to recover from a conflict with Potter and a moment when he'd shown himself weak. It surely wouldn't have been so easy with Severus. "If they say nonsensical things, then no, you haven't really invited them into your mind. If they say things that matter and pertain to the situation, then yes, you've communicated with them."

Potter let out a slow breath. His eyes no longer saw Draco, or at least Draco didn't think they did. "So-this sounds an awful lot like prophetic dreams, or at least significant ones," he muttered. "That must be where a lot of the legends of the Seers came from."

"Probably," Draco said. "But even more, we just haven't been taught to communicate with magical creatures that way, Potter. It's the sort of thing that appears in fairy stories and everyone knows vaguely is supposed to work. But we consider ourselves superior to them, so we don't practice it. I wouldn't be surprised if you had to try more than once," he added, because Potter was staring at him. _What, does he imagine that we would do nothing but communicate with other beings if we had the chance? _"You'll have your own ingrained prejudices to work against."

"If this is all true," Potter breathed, "why didn't you reach out to them for allies against Snape?"

"What, when they want to work against the Ashborn, or probably do?" Draco shook his head. "Why would I?"

Potter nodded a moment later as if he understood, but Draco wasn't sure that he did. He moved on to another subject. "If they ask me to do something against the Ashborn, should I explain about the Vows?"

Draco arched an eyebrow. "I can hardly see that you'll have any choice, and truly, there's no reason they shouldn't have that information. Most of the wizarding world will have it; they'd need the reassurance that the Ashborn won't move against them. And the centaurs would expect you to rebel against your confinement otherwise."

Potter grunted, his gaze fixed on the far wall. "Fuck," he said at last. "I wish that Snape hadn't been so thorough."

Draco studied his profile, and gave in to curiosity. "All of Severus's Vows-the Vows he made, I mean-were to protect other people. Your people," he added, when Potter gave him a sharp stare. He probably thought Severus had never protected anyone in his life. Draco wanted to explain to him about what had happened when he and Severus first came to the Death Eaters after Dumbledore's death, but there were some things still too private to talk about, no matter how much of an ally Potter was.

"Yes," Potter said. "Of course. I wouldn't have given myself up as a hostage if it wouldn't have ended the war, and I needed _some _assurance that Snape would keep his word."

Draco let the apparent belief that Severus was incapable of honor pass by. After all, he didn't think _he _knew what Severus was capable of and what he wasn't anymore. "And all the Vows you made were directed at keeping you in place."

Potter shrugged. "A fat lot of good it would do him if his hostage escaped or was useless because he killed his followers or got himself killed."

"But that's the difference," Draco said. "You sacrificed yourself for others. You didn't demand in the Vows you had him swear that he treat you well."

Potter blinked, as if he recognized the fact for the first time but thought it an unremarkable one. "Well, and so?" he asked at last. "Like I said, I knew that he would probably do it, because killing me would have led to war, and it was obvious the Ashborn didn't want that."

"Don't you care about your life at _all_?" Draco asked. "I don't want a suicidal ally, or one who would agree to-I don't know, die if that was what the magical creatures wanted in exchange for freeing the Ashborn. _We _don't need you to make a sacrifice for us."

Potter gave him a peculiar smile. "You have no idea how badly I want to live," he said quietly. "There were circumstances during the war when I probably could have killed Vol-sorry, Feasting-on-Corpses by walking into his camp and giving myself up to be tortured while someone else sneaked in and did the appropriate things to lower his protections." Still avoiding details, Draco thought. There was something there, something Potter had done to defeat the Dark Lord that he didn't want any of them to know about. Perhaps he thought it would make them murder him for revenge, and with Bellatrix, that could be a real concern, if Severus ever lost control of her. "But I didn't do that. I was too selfish. I found other ways to fight him instead, and here I am, still alive." He held out his hands. "_Dum spiro, spero._"

"I know what that means," Draco said haughtily.

Potter nodded. "I thought you did," he said, with no inflection in his voice. "But I thought you would probably be surprised to know I did."

"Why did you agree to come here and give up your life and hope for freedom if you want it so badly?" Draco asked.

"This is still life," Potter said, tossing him a surprised glance. "Not the one I'd hoped for, no. But still...there's work to do here. I feared going mad because of boredom more than anything else. I don't think I will now." He turned back to the scrap of parchment the centaurs had sent him. "And so thinking of them when I fall asleep is all I need to do?"

"It should be," Draco said. "We're magical, you know, and that means something. It's different for us than Muggles. They could think about centaurs all they wanted, and they would never receive contact."

Potter shrugged. "Sure. But like I said, I've never done this before, and I've had problems with mental arts like it in the past."

"And trouble mentally in general, I'm sure," Draco muttered, before he could stop himself.

Potter only gave him a tolerant smile and stood to pass him. On the way, he hesitated, then reached out and gripped his shoulder.

"If you need to talk about something," he said, "or just discuss the ways that Snape's a bastard, then come and find me."

"I told you, he didn't rape me. It's _fine_." Draco folded his arms and inched backwards from the hand that Potter was holding out to him, which wavered and dropped.

"But you should have seen your face," Potter said, apparently in answer to his statement, and walked out. Draco saw the shadow that was Bellatrix waiting at the door. She followed Potter with a silent glide.

Draco sat in the library for a long time.

* * *

_All right. We'll try this._

The snake was on its way with more letters for Ron and Hermione. Harry had reassured Ron that he missed them, too, and that he wasn't going to forget them, and he'd told Hermione flatly not to research wand cores or anything else about wands that might stretch the limits of an Unbreakable Vow. He'd made it, and he was going to hold to it.

It was deep night, and he was tired, so tired he could feel the ghosts of sleep drifting around him and pressing down on his eyelids.

_This might work._

He snorted and lay back, folding the sheets over him. Even if it didn't, he was as close to committed as he could get, now.

The dreams that enfolded him seemed thicker than usual. He floated through what seemed to be stone corridors, though those could simply be reflections of the Ashborn fortress he was living in. At one point he thought he was standing in a wide white room with walls made of bone. When he reached out to touch them, they vanished and became the trees of the Forest of Dean, where he and Ron and Hermione had lived for a time while hunting one of the Horcruxes.

"Harry Potter."

Or they might be the trees of the Forbidden Forest, Harry conceded to himself as he turned around. He had never been all _that _great at telling forests apart.

Behind him stood a white centaur with a constantly swishing, straw-blond tail and a pale face. On one of his shoulders sat the white raven, which bobbed its head in greeting and then ignored Harry. The centaur studied Harry closely, looking for who-knew-what kinds of signs, then pawed the ground once and nodded.

"You are permitted to approach," he said.

Harry took a hesitant step nearer. Then he came in closer, and closer, and only halted when the centaur held up a hand. By that point, he was close enough that he had to tilt his head back to look the centaur in the eye. His eyes were dark, reminding Harry of the raven.

"We want to know what you know about the covenant," the centaur said.

Harry blinked. "I don't know anything about it."

"But you used a spell that comes from it." The centaur began to circle to the side, keeping a careful eye on Harry. Harry turned, hearing the rustle of leaves and grass beneath his feet as he did. _This is bloody realistic, is what it is. _"You must have encountered a book that mentioned it, and using that spell is earnest of wanting to renew the covenant."

"I used a book about magical creatures," Harry said. "That spell was one invented by a wizard who wanted to communicate with you lot. Newt Scamander?"

The white centaur paused, one hoof uplifted, and stared at something over Harry's head. "He would not come here," he whispered. "But he could be invoked by the light of Saturn. Where does the ringed brother stand?" He cocked his head up. Harry followed his gaze, but if he was looking for stars, they were invisible to him behind the clouds.

Harry nodded in resignation. Until that point, the centaur had asked direct questions, but sooner or later they all got mysterious and started in with the stars and planets. Trying to ask them for help during the war had been useless.

He waited for the dream to fade, because the white centaur didn't seem interested in him anymore and Harry didn't have the will to keep the dream alive. But the centaur turned back to him a minute later. His face was set in a strong frown. Harry tried to shuffle unobtrusively backwards. He didn't know if he could use magic here, and the centaur could smash his face in with a punch.

"You must bring the other one with you," the centaur said. "The one who knows about the covenant."

"I don't know what you mean," Harry said, and his irritation was bleeding through his attempt to be polite. "I only just found out that I could communicate with you in dreams. I've never heard of the covenant, and if I don't know what you mean, then I can't help you."

He wasn't really expecting that to work-after all, it never had when they wanted the centaurs' help on the Horcrux hunt-but the centaur jolted as though someone had stung him on the forehead, and then leaned forwards, peering into Harry's eyes. Harry gritted his teeth and didn't shy backwards the way he wanted to, although the temptation was heavy.

The raven spread its wings and lifted into the sky. The centaur nodded. "You are not the one who knows that truth," he said, as if that satisfied him and should satisfy Harry. "Tell the one who knows to call us into his dreams, and then we will achieve what we wish to." He whirled around and cantered into the forest.

Harry took a step after him, but the white raven was suddenly hovering in front of him, staring into his eyes. Harry frowned at it. He was a little more confident about his ability to handle the bird if it attacked him. "What do you lot _want_?" he asked. "I was just reaching out because I wanted to communicate with someone, anyone, to ease my boredom, but you're taking it more seriously than I imagined."

The raven gave a soft caw and settled on his shoulder for a moment, drawing a strand of Harry's hair through its beak to nibble on. Harry relaxed, staring at it. Then the raven bit him sharply on the ear, and he found himself sitting up with his chest and his head both hurting.

He reached up cautiously and felt the edge of his ear, but there was no blood there, and no bite.

He did lie awake until dawn, though, trying to reason his way through the riddle the centaur had tossed him. Only when the dawn came and Bellatrix knocked on his door to wake him up did he realize that a covenant sounded a lot like the old, interconnected pure-blood culture that Malfoy had tried to explain to him.

Harry sighed, rubbed sleep-dust out of his eyes, and called something absent in response to Bellatrix's demand that he get up. Malfoy hadn't said anything about magical creatures being part of the alliances among the old pure-blood families, but Harry was sure that he'd done research on it, or would know what Harry meant if he asked. He'd known about the ability to communicate with centaurs in dreams, after all, when Harry had assumed it would take raiding the library for books at the very least.

_Whether I want him to or not, Malfoy is going to be part of this._

* * *

"What are you translating today, Draco?"

Draco started and looked up at Severus as if he hadn't expected to find him in the library. Severus did not know why not. He was trying to take more of an interest in Draco's doings, since he had revealed the other evening-wittingly or not-that Potter was beginning to corrupt him. Severus slid into a seat on the other side of the wide library table and waited for Draco to respond.

Draco swallowed and moved one hand restlessly over the page in front of him, as though he would cover the words. Severus had already glanced at them and made out the runes for "animal," "wonder," and "covenant." Probably a way to breed magical creatures such as Crups, he thought dismissively. He would not begrudge Draco pets who might be companions to him, as long as they did not get into the labs. He would probably have to forbid Kneazles, who had clever paws and wondering minds and a tendency to wander in where they were not wanted.

"A-new book," Draco said. "Something not written by someone in the Black family, this time. I thought it was time that I traveled beyond my family line." He looked down, flushing as if he knew how inadequate the response was.

Severus waited, but Draco said nothing more. Severus kept the irritation behind his teeth. This was the sort of thing that Albus would have urged him to have, a "connection" with a lover. It was the sort of thing that love poetry praised so highly, that Gryffindors spoke of with trembling voices and tears in their eyes.

It was useless. A skill that had no basis in reality, that could not make potions change color or acquire new properties. Severus did not know why he had tried, not when Draco refused to respond.

"What is it about?" Severus asked at last. This exercise was worse than grinding hen's teeth, especially given how much it bored him.

Draco looked as if he would squirm himself to death in the chair from sheer embarrassment. Perhaps he understood the waste of Severus's time without Severus having to explain it to him, Severus thought in some approval. It would not be the first time Draco had demonstrated finer sensibilities, beyond the common. "Magical creatures," he stammered at last. "I don't know much more than that yet. I only just began."

Severus waited. It seemed to him that Draco should have more than that to say to the man who had saved his life, who had become his lover, who had placed the first Mark on his arm and freed him from the domination the Dark Lord might have exerted even in death.

But Draco simply sat there, stubbornly avoiding his eyes, and in the end Severus did not have the patience to endure the boy's temper tantrum. He rose to his feet and nodded as one equal to another, although he doubted Draco recognized the implied courtesy.

"When you wish to tell me, I will be here," he said, and turned to depart the room with a swirl of his robes.

* * *

Draco took a silent, shrill breath and pushed his forehead into his hands. The Mark on his arm stung and hissed back at him, the way it did whenever Severus felt anger directed at him.

But for the first time since the Dark Lord had died, Draco was not lashing himself into a frenzy at the thought of what Severus might do to him if he was displeased. He was not enormously worried about what might happen if his lover turned his back on him, in fact, though he had been before. He had only as much power and influence with the Ashborn as Severus wanted to give him. Discard him, and Severus removed the hope of a life Draco had with one stroke.

Draco's hand closed on the page of the book he was studying, and he had to make a conscious effort to smooth it flat again.

Now...

This book talked more about the ancient pure-blood society Draco was also painfully learning about, and in details that Argellus Black's book hadn't revealed.

Magical creatures had been among the alliances that tied wizards close together, and there had been debts given to them and honors received from them that Draco had never heard of before. He knew most modern wizards, including his parents, would have been scornful at the idea. Magical creatures were sources of Potions ingredients, dangerous beasts to be avoided, or occasional helpful adjuncts in events like the Tri-Wizard Tournament. Their ancestors had once held other attitudes, of course, but they knew better.

_Our ancestors also held powers that we don't anymore, and were capable of feats we haven't seen the equal of since. I think I know now why those powers disappeared. _

He had knowledge Severus didn't. Knowledge was power, along with sleeping in someone's bed and pleasing the already powerful. He could-perhaps, if he had the chance, if he _seized _the chance-make a life for himself outside Severus's orbit.

Consequently, when Potter came to him with the proposition that both of them should visit the centaurs in their dreams, Draco was ready to listen.


	6. Meeting the Allies

Thank you again for all the reviews!

_Chapter Six-Meeting the Allies_

The snake automaton raised its head and turned it slowly back and forth. Severus smiled tightly, lowering his wand. He knew it had been worthwhile to wait and not go running to Potter with an appeal that would have caused Severus to feel stupid for making it-

With a weak clatter, the automaton fell back against the table, and the life left its jeweled eyes. Severus, his teeth clenched, repeated the spell that had made it live, but nothing happened. Several other variations of the same spell raised no spark. The snake was once again a mere collection of metal and jewels, without the faint self-will that Severus insisted his servants have once they left his presence.

He wondered for a moment if he could use a kind of Legilimency on the snake. He had not created the loyalty to him in Bellatrix's mind from the ground up, but used the materials he found there. And she performed some of the same duties that he would want the snake to take up, or had until he set her guarding Potter.

_Potter. Why did everything begin to go wrong when he entered our enclave? _

Severus closed his eyes and, in his mind, walked a small spiral that was one of the basic shapes he made his Occlumency shields out of. He was letting his emotions interfere with his rational thought. That was useless, it was stupid, and it was worse than either; it would cost him time and materials that he could ill afford to lose. When he opened his eyes again, he was calm, although he had to look away from the snake automaton to become fully so.

No, he could not use the same sort of Legilimency on the snake, as he admitted to himself readily when he thought about it. It did not have a mind for him to build up from. Taming Bellatrix's insanity had required raw materials; he did not have them now.

_You could, if Potter would help you with his Parseltongue._

Severus shook his head. He could not be absolutely sure that Potter still possessed the Slytherin gift, although some of the reports that had trickled in during the war suggested he did. And if he did, what motive would he have to use it to help Severus?

_You could offer him privileges. A supervised visit with his friends. More time outside. Less restricted access to the library._

Severus paused. Then he turned and took a drink from the small pot of cool water that he kept nearby for such purposes as splashing his face when he was engaged in a long bout of cutting and dicing. The water cooled his flushed cheeks, but it could not calm the furious heat in his mouth.

Once, bribery of that kind would have been his first thought, and he _knew _that he could choose bait, such as seeing his friends, that Potter would find hard to refuse.

Why had he not thought of it before this?

_Because Potter renders me irrational. Because I would rather avoid thinking about him, no matter how he could help me, no matter how he is affecting Draco. I have cared more for my hatred of him than for how he might be able to help me, or how I might need to act against him._

Severus closed his eyes. The Ashborn had their name for a reason. They had risen from the ashes of the Death Eaters, and from the remnants of the powder that their enemies would have crushed them to. He had gone through a rebirth, as well, from servant to master and lord. He had bound his servants ruthlessly, to make sure that no one could betray him as he had betrayed the Dark Lord.

But if he was truly made over in a new image, then he should have left his damaging hatred of James Potter behind him.

Severus sat down on the chair behind the table that contained the snake automaton. He watched it with cool eyes, so that someone who walked in would not catch him in a moment of doubt and indecision.

_That's another thing. Who would walk in and catch you like that? Draco knows better-and he is likely to avoid you after the argument you had last night, in any case. Your Ashborn think only what you tell them to think._

It was another sign that his old habits were left over, rotting in his brain and potentially controlling his actions if he was not careful. He did not want that to happen. He stood and went for a turn around his office, thinking.

Perhaps there were certain things he needed to do that he had thought he did _not _need. Perhaps he needed to spend more time around beauty, and appreciating music, a taste of his that he had nearly let die. Perhaps he needed to learn to speak to Potter with the cool indifference he had _thought _he was cultivating, whether or not the boy was the son of someone he hated.

_And the son of someone you love. _The two emotions should cancel each other out. Severus had believed they did when he made the original plan to have Potter swear Unbreakable Vows and take him hostage. Otherwise, how would he able to tolerate having someone like Potter constantly in the place that he had meant to make a sanctuary?

But he had not acted that way. He had acted like a spoiled child, and it had taken no one else to tell him so. It had been his reflection in Draco's eyes and Draco's cold silence around him that told him the truth.

_I owe Draco for that. I must find a way to pay the debt._

Severus closed his eyes again. So he had determined that he had acted in an irrational manner, that he owed a debt to his younger lover whom he liked to think of as in debt to him, and that he would probably never be able to make his snake automaton move if not for the help of a boy who had no reason to favor him, every reason to dislike him.

_Begin with the bribery of Potter first. _He knew instinctively that that would take less effort for him than apologizing to Draco would. _And in the meantime, you can observe him for signs of what might have attracted Draco, at least enough that he is listening to Potter._

* * *

Draco leaned back from the book and nodded. He didn't feel as though he had the strength to open his eyes right now, after using them to read the crabbed handwriting in the book for so many hours. "You were right," he said, half-drowsily. "The magical creatures are part of this alliance, and part of the covenant that existed between the old pure-blood families. They could serve as neutral judges when the families really couldn't come to a conclusion, and they could grant gifts and powers that made the difference in individual duels."

He hoped that his dry voice masked just how shaken he was. The only magical creatures he'd had contact with regularly when he was young were house-elves, and you didn't have to look hard to see how inferior _they _were. The centaurs, the merfolk, the unicorns, the dragons, and all the rest-wizards had tamed them, or held them at bay, or could avoid them. They were irrelevant to Draco's life except as a set of facts, to be learned the same way that he learned the finer points of Transfiguration and Astronomy. They might affect his magic. They would not affect his _life._

But now, he had evidence that they had been central to the life of his people, once, in the same way that interdependence had.

He was glad, suddenly and selfishly, that his parents had not lived to see this new world. It would have confused them beyond bearing, and they would not have understood his desire to live in that way, so opposite to everything they had taught him.

"That's interesting," Potter said, jolting Draco back to some remembrance of his audience. He sat up and shook his hair out of his eyes. If Potter noticed, he didn't care enough to say anything about it aloud, just nodded and tapped his fingers on the table beside the book, staring at the far wall. "I wonder what led to the attitudes changing? Everyone I knew acted like Hermione was crazy for wanting to free house-elves, even the ones like Dumbledore who respected other magical creatures and would let them teach in the school."

Draco shrugged. "Presumably they couldn't remain in our world after people began changing and they didn't have the place they used to have in the councils of the wise and powerful."

"But that doesn't explain what led to the change in the first place."

Draco rolled his eyes and leaned across the table. "The important part is that I have no idea how we can share a dream so that we can both speak to the same magical creatures at the same time. Should we both try to go tonight? Or only me? The centaur you talked to seemed to want to talk to _me_."

Potter gave him a brief flash of exasperation, but nodded. "Yes. Go ahead. You know more than I do about this 'covenant' that they mentioned." He yawned and laid his head on the library table as if he would go to sleep there. "I feel like I didn't get much rest last night, anyway," he muttered.

Draco poked him until he lifted his head and gave Draco a sleepy scowl. "You're really all right with this?" Draco demanded. "I thought you were the one saying that you had to have something to live for, and I assumed contacting and speaking with the magical creatures was going to be it."

Potter shrugged. "This is a lifelong project. Or at least, it seems like it will be. I can let you go first and not assume that that means you're taking it over."

Draco eyed him without saying anything. _This _Potter was different from anyone else he'd ever met. He wasn't jealous, wasn't ambitious, but he also didn't seem to care that anyone else was, unlike the Gryffindors in Hogwarts. Draco had thought this hostage situation would never work, that Potter would burst out screaming and try to carve his way through the walls by now. But that didn't seem to be happening.

"Why are you able to survive here?" he asked.

Potter raised an eyebrow. "There's this thing called air, and this other thing called food that you keep giving me-"

"Not _that_," Draco said, and was at least glad that the irritation he felt because of that remark was familiar. "I mean, how can you survive without the fresh air and the running around and the company of your friends that I assumed was essential to you?"

Potter gave him a long, slow look. "None of those things are essential," he said. "Sure, I would prefer to have them. But it doesn't _matter, _really, that I don't have them. I can survive without them. I would never have become a hostage if I couldn't. Really, Malfoy," he added in what sounded like exasperation, probably because of the way that Draco was looking at him. "Were you expecting me to sob on your shoulder?"

"Something like that," Draco muttered, but he didn't say more because it was so embarrassing, and so was his curiosity about Potter's inner needs. Severus wouldn't care about something like that, and while Draco no longer held Severus's ideals to be the perfection of truth, he did think that he needed to be as ruthless as he was to survive their confrontation.

Besides, he didn't have the words. What he wanted to ask was: How can you accept this? How can you think it's all right that the protections on the _incubitum _flung you against the walls? How can you put up with Bellatrix, who you have to hate for killing your godfather? (Draco had listened to that particular gloating tale over and over again when Bellatrix still had her own mind, one of the reasons he was glad it was gone). How can you sit here and talk to me as if we were never enemies, and even get concerned about the Ashborn?

But in the end, he thought he just had to be grateful that those particular emotions of Potter's existed, without trying to interpret them or understand them. They went back to planning what they should do about the magical creatures, and Potter seemed perfectly pleased to have it so.

* * *

"A word with you, Potter."

The Ashborn who stopped him wasn't someone Harry knew, a tall man with dark eyes and a thin dark moustache that looked like the aftermath of a Potions accident no one had bothered to clean up. He frowned at Harry once as though trying to decide what he was doing there and whether it was allowed, then shook his head and turned his back, walking away up the corridor. Harry shrugged and followed. Maybe this was someone Malfoy had sent to fetch him.

But they ended up in a corridor filled with fumes and noisome smells, and Harry guessed where they were going. He was already braced, a charm cast on his nose to block out the rest of the reek, by the time that the Ashborn touched the wall beside the door of Snape's potions lab.

"Lord Snape." He whispered the words, as though he thought the direct pressure of Snape's attention and glory might well destroy him. "This unworthy one escorts another unworthy one to face you."

There was a pause, so long that Harry really thought they might not get through, which would be fine with him. Then the door to the lab shuddered and opened. The Ashborn led Harry through, glancing around nervously now and then.

The lab smelled bad enough inside to get through the charm. Harry tried not to be too obvious about breathing through his mouth. That was probably an insult to Potions masters under Section 13 of the Unreasonable Wizards' Code.

The simmering cauldrons sparked blue and brown and green. The tables ran the length of the room and were full of diced plants, cut-up animals in various stages of dissection, and whole lumps of rock that Snape hadn't got around to yet. Harry did see something else, a faceted, gleaming crystal lump, that might have been a piece of unicorn horn, and he wondered how Snape had bought it. Then he decided that that might belong in the category of things he was better off not knowing.

"Potter."

There was Snape, standing near the front of the room with something long and silver sprawled on the table in front of him. As Harry got closer, he realized that it resembled a snake made of metal. He blinked. Malfoy had said something about Snape's automatons, but Harry had assumed he was referring to the Ashborn.

Apparently he was referring to creatures that Snape built and enchanted. Harry shook his head. _Is there anything he doesn't get off on controlling? _

They came to a halt in front of Snape, who watched Harry with quiet, measuring eyes before he flapped a hand to dismiss the Ashborn. Harry bit his lip so that he wouldn't make the remark he wanted to about how Snape treated the Ashborn as if he were shooing chickens.

That left him, standing alone in front of Snape, while Snape looked at him to find some way he could control him. Harry met his eyes and said nothing. The only way that Snape might have frightened him was if he could read Harry's mind, and Harry's own fucked-up memories acted as an impenetrable barrier.

"Do you know why I brought you here?" Snape asked.

Harry shook his head, and carefully kept all the comments that he could have made behind his teeth. _Of course not, you idiot. No one told me, and God forbid that I deprive you of the pleasure of explaining something to the imbecile you think me to be. _

More than anything else, he thought, he felt _tired _of Snape. He was sneaking around the restrictions imposed on him by the Unbreakable Vows only because there was no other way that he could help Malfoy and the Ashborn, not because he feared Snape's wrath. Snape was simply irrelevant to his life, in the way that foul weather was. Harry had run through bushes and sneaked up on camps and killed in the rain and the mud, in the midst of ice and snow and windstorms. He would resist Snape in the same way, no matter what Snape did to him.

Perhaps Snape saw something of that in his eyes, and didn't like it, because he turned abruptly away and pointed at the segmented silver snake on the table. Harry looked at it with mild curiosity. His first impression was that whoever had made it didn't know much about snake anatomy. The head was out of proportion, and the jaws unhinged. That meant the snake wouldn't be able to eat anything bigger than itself, something quite a few of them did.

"I animate these creatures to help me around the lab and to guard my estates," Snape said. "I have consistently failed to animate this snake. My research reveals that most of the spells would be easier if I had someone who spoke Parseltongue on my side. With your help, it might move."

Harry waited to see if he would say anything else, but Snape just stood there, paying more attention to the snake than him. Harry at last shrugged and responded, "Why does that matter? I assume that you have other guards and assistants enough." Now that he was looking for it, he could see distant gleams of metal that were probably Snape's other assistants, while he had taken them for the sides of cauldrons and silvery machines like the ones Dumbledore had had in his office before. "I'm not going to help you awaken this just because you want me to."

Snape turned to face him in an abrupt movement, his robes swirling softly still around him. Harry met his eyes, again, without fear. _I wonder if anyone's ever told him how much he looks like a mantis._

"I can give you gifts," Snape said. "I can let you see your friends. I do not think you were anticipating such a gift when you came into my service."

_Service? _Harry kept the sneer he wanted to give at that off his face. He wasn't Snape's servant, no more than Malfoy was-or, well, at least than Malfoy _could _be, given that he was slowly breaking free of the influence Snape had extended over him. But he reckoned that Snape didn't grasp the idea of someone with free will living in the same building as he was who didn't fall under the categories of servant, slave, or fucktoy.

"Assuming that I got to see my friends," Harry asked, "how long would the visits be, and when, and where, and how many would I be allowed? I assume you'd cut them off the minute you had the snake animated."

Snape stared at him. He obviously hadn't been expecting the negotiation. _Well, why would he, when everyone else bows and scrapes at his feet or they're so scared because he rapes them? _

"I would permit three visits," Snape said at last, slowly. Harry thought he was testing the boundaries of the conversation, waiting to see how much he actually had to give up. "In the fortress of the Ashborn, under conditions that include five guards, one of whom must be Bellatrix. I would be there as well if I deemed it necessary. Each visit would be no longer than a half-hour."

"That sounds good," Harry said. "But I need some sort of promise that my friends would be able to leave again safely, rather than being seized as hostages themselves."

"What would I want with two more Gryffindors, neither of whom were vital to the war effort?" Snape was staring at him again.

Harry had to muffle a chuckle. That just proved that Snape didn't know as much about the last war as he thought he did. "I don't trust your statements of self-interest," he said. "I never know when you'll think of something else that would actually serve your self-interest better. So. A promise?"

"This is a rather hefty price for aid on an automaton that you may not be able to provide," Snape said, his eyes so narrow Harry was surprised he could see out of them.

"You don't get it, Snape." Harry felt free to put an elbow on the table and lounge there, smiling at him. Snape tensed up, which was even better. "I'm not afraid of you. I don't have anything to gain from helping you, unless you make and keep certain promises. I have no reason to put my friends in danger because you want me to. I have no reason to do _anything _just because you want me to. So. Are you going to make the promise I want you to or not?"

* * *

Severus did not know what to make of this.

The boy was not afraid. A common tactic of Gryffindors, to say that and to mistake their foolish bravado for invulnerability. But the boy said it as though it was true, and didn't reveal any of the telltales that Severus was used to: the blinking eyes, the flushed cheeks, the hesitancy to talk about what they feared in case it gave their enemies ideas. Potter seemed to have identified the worst thing and gone directly for it, as well as assuming that Severus would have no reason to be charitable to him.

_And of course I do not. But he ought to realize that, within the confines of bargaining for something I want, I would be more reasonable than he thinks, now, that I would. _

"You know the Vows I made," Severus said, to test the boy's understanding. "You know the ones you made. Nowhere in them does it speak of such things as regular meals, freedom from harassment other than purely physical harassment, or being put to sleep with a potion."

Potter met his eyes. There was something _off _about the boy's gaze in response to him, Severus noted. A wildness at the back of it, as though he was a feral creature considering whether to step forwards and take food from the human hand that was offering it.

"If you try to hurt me," Potter said quietly, "then I can retaliate. That's built into the Vows. I know you might kill me. But another thing I'm not afraid of, Snape, is death." His smile widened. "A few of the Death Eaters learned the hard way that you can't really put a chain on someone like that."

Severus did not step away, but he felt a certain part of him chill and grow quiescent. "You are saying that you are suicidal," he said. "That rather changes what I can offer you and what I can expect from you, yes."

Potter actually rolled his eyes. Severus could not remember the last time a gesture of such defiance had been launched at him, and it made him wrongfooted, so that he couldn't respond before Potter did. "Not suicidal, you idiot. Just not afraid of what you can do to me. I surrendered myself as a hostage because it was good for my friends and because the wizarding world doesn't need another war, not because I'm afraid for my life or because I was secretly hoping that I could escape someday." He held out his hands. "This? What you see is what you get. I made the Vows honestly. You're too used to dealing with people who hold things back, or with people who have nothing to hold back because you've _told _them you can't." A sharp spark of disgust made his green eyes bitter. "You can't use fear as a tool to control me. Now, can we move past that and go back to the negotiation? Because I would like to see my friends again."

Severus strangled the emotions that tried to rear their heads. He drowned them, poisoned them, fed them potions that would keep them subdued. He could not afford to let Potter control their interaction at the moment. He must face him with calmness, or he would lose.

"The conditions that I named before are acceptable to you?" he asked briskly.

Potter nodded. "Along with the promise that you won't harm my friends while they're here, or prevent them from leaving." He stared at Severus.

Severus found that he had to avoid those eyes for the first time. Not because they were so intimidating, not because they were the color of Lily's, but because there was too much in them to think about. He stared over Potter's shoulder instead, with the distance on his face that had fooled more than one student into thinking that he knew every detail of their lives, and said, "The promise must be conditional. If they attempt to hurt one of my people, then I must be able to hurt them."

Potter shrugged. "That's fine. But I want your promise now."

"I will not give you another Unbreakable Vow," Severus said, and a mocking tone he had not planned crept into his voice. "And however could you trust me without one?"

Potter looked at him remotely. "If you give me a promise and keep it, it'll be sufficient. If you don't make a promise, no deal. If you make me a promise and break it, then I promise that I'll hurt as many of your people as I can before the broken Vow kills me." He smiled at Severus, a tainted smile. "And I can promise that you won't like the kind of damage that I can inflict."

"I do not respond well to threats," Severus said quietly.

"Neither do I," Potter said. "And yet you keep trying them. Are you going to make the promise or not, and are you going to keep it or not? It should be simple. Don't hide in the shadows and threaten treachery that you have no intention of making real."

Severus started to snap back, and then ground his teeth against each other. He had _promised _himself that he would not do this. He had not known it would be so hard to keep his word to himself, the person in the world who most deserved it.

"I will make the promise," he said. "And I will keep it with the condition that I imposed from the first."

"All right," Potter said, and stepped forwards so that he was closer to the snake. "Now, what's wrong with it? What have you tried so far?" He began to hiss steadily before Severus could respond, bending down to the snake as if it had ears and could hear him.

Severus opened his mouth to comment that the beast would not be able to hear him until he had at least woken it up, and for that they needed the spells that only someone with a mastery of Parseltongue could speak-

And then slammed his mouth shut again, glad that Potter had not been facing him, when the snake's head surged up and the elongated jaws parted, the forked silvery tongue flickering out. The snake cocked its jeweled, gleaming eyes at Potter, and from it emerged a sound like a steam kettle going to battle. Severus could not distinguish words in it, but then, he could not distinguish them in Potter's Parseltongue, either.

The boy smiled, a serene smile of the kind that Severus was unused to seeing from him, and leaned his elbow on the table, continuing to speak to the snake. It began to heave its body up, swaying back and forth. Severus had marked a certain point in his mind as that where the neck ended and the body began, but the automaton didn't seem inclined to treat it that way, instead raising itself further and further and dancing above the boy like a giant cobra.

Potter truly had forgotten how to fear. He kept looking up, and speaking in a gentle hiss, if there was such a thing. He could have been telling the snake how to move, how to attack Severus, or where the bathrooms were. Severus could still make out nothing from his lips but a steady stream of sibilants.

The automaton opened its jaws at one point and bent down as though it would bite Potter's head off. The fangs were big enough to frame his skull. The boy raised an eyebrow, remained still, and said something with a wry tone in his voice. The snake lowered its body back to the table and hissed something back loudly enough to make a few cauldrons rattle.

Finally, Potter seemed to have finished the conversation. Severus expected the snake to slump back to the table again when he turned away from it, but it remained upright, and turned faceted eyes on him for the first time. Severus gathered his dignity around him as Potter said, "That should do it. What did you want it to do?"

"How did you command it without using spells?" Severus asked. Potter blinked at him, and he added, "Forgive me for not wanting fangs to close on me as I lie in bed at night, acting on your command."

"I couldn't do that," Potter said simply. "I'm forbidden from attacking you magically, and this would count." He turned back to the snake, and watched its swaying. "You made this better than you know. There was a living spirit in the back of it, a spirit made of magic and the-the formation of the body. I don't know how to say it better than that. You made a snake, and a snake came to live in it. Just not the snake that you may have intended."

Severus gestured shortly for the boy to continue. He had no patience for much of the mysticism behind many people's conceptions of magic. He could live with it better if he watched the results and in the end attached them to a skeleton of substantial magical theory.

"Parseltongue means that humans and snakes can understand each other," Potter said. "It's not really the language that snakes speak among themselves, you know. That doesn't involve much _sound, _for one thing. But I made contact with the spirit that you'd summoned without realizing it. It probably would have done what you wanted from the beginning, but you couldn't reach across the space between it and you and make it understand your needs." He reached up and smoothed a hand along the silver segments. The snake seemed to watch him tolerantly. "Now, I can tell it what you want it to do, and it'll do that."

"Will any future commands have to come from you?" Severus demanded. It infuriated him that the automaton he had made which seemed to work the best would have to take orders from someone else.

Potter blinked at him. "Of course not. For one thing, I don't think you'll have to change its orders often. For another, I can make a recording of the Parseltongue words for you, and you can play it for the snake. It was just the initial communication that couldn't be established by anyone but a Parselmouth."

Severus snarled. Being close to Potter was steadily driving him mad, making him think thoughts that had no weight and no importance, making him wonder about things that should not concern him. "Leave. Now."

Potter still didn't back away. The disadvantages of fearlessness were many, Severus decided, though Potter might not think so. "When are you going to arrange the visits with my friends?"

"Only you would ask something like that," Severus said, and made sure that his words were freighted with the full weight of the inconvenience that Potter was causing him. "In full consciousness of the fact that it is more complex than that, that I will have to consider my schedule and the Ashborn who are available."

"Well, yes, of course I'm the only one who would ask something like that," Potter said, staring at him. "Since I'm the only one currently around here who you can even _make _promises like that to, never mind the only one who would expect you to fulfill them. I might include Malfoy, but he's too obedient to you. You've eaten him out from the inside, which seems to be your course of action with most people." Abruptly, he grinned. "Is that why you're so irritated with me? Because I won't just rip open my belly and give you a good meal?"

"Go, Potter," Severus said.

Potter nodded at him and walked out of the room. Severus reached out, touched Bellatrix's Mark with his mind, and made sure that she would be ready to receive him.

He shut his eyes when the boy was gone and leaned against the table. He was so angry that he was shaking.

No, his reactions to Potter were not rational. But neither was his conviction that he could control the boy through bribes, and tame his tongue because of an expected pleasure. Potter was not a dog, to stop barking because he was offered a biscuit. Severus did not know why he had expected him to be.

_Because nothing else works. And something _must.

He would find it. He would make Potter yield to him, and have respect for him in the end, or at least fear. But he would not find it standing here and letting anger rule his mind.

He opened his eyes-

And only then realized that he had never had Potter give the snake its orders in Parseltongue in the way that he had offered to, and which Severus knew he would need. Either in spoken or recorded form, the orders could only come from the boy.

A vial shattered against the far wall.

* * *

Draco closed his eyes that night wondering if he was really prepared to face centaurs after all.

He knew more about them than Potter did, simply because he had grown up in the wizarding world, and he knew more about how they fit into the ancient pure-blood society because he had read books that Potter hadn't. But that didn't mean that he would understand all their riddles or their attempts to trick him.

If they _were _attempts to trick him, Draco thought ruefully as he closed his eyes and filled his mind with visions of the Forbidden Forest, gleaming bay bodies and long swishing tails and grave human faces. That was the problem with centaurs. Helping, by their lights, might mean telling the truth wrapped in too many riddles to unravel before it was too late.

Although, in this case, was there such a thing as "too late?" Draco had the rest of his life to build this pure-blood culture back up and to understand the role that the centaurs had played in it.

_No, you don't. Not if Severus becomes suspicious of what you're doing and tries to stop it._

Draco took a deep breath and shook his head. He was getting distracted from his whole purpose in going to bed this early, and that was stupid. With some effort, he relaxed his mind back to contemplating magical creatures, and tried to remember all the details that Potter had told him about _his _dream. Leaves beneath his feet, he said, and the soft crackle that accompanied them. Dusk, and stars overhead. Well, that would make sense when the dream was taking place at night. The scents of grass and trees, and Draco was sure that he had a better sense of smell and a better imagination than Potter, since he was so much better at potions-

"Welcome, Covenant's Child."

Draco jumped and whirled around. The leaves, sure enough, rustled and shifted beneath his feet. He found himself staring into the face of the implacable centaur Potter had described.

He hadn't made it clear how _large _the white beast was, though. Draco stiffened his legs so that he wouldn't back away and bowed his head. "Thank you, noble centaur." That would have to do until he learned names. "Why did you want to see me?"

The centaur trotted closer. Potter had said that he carried a white raven with him, but Draco couldn't see one. Perhaps the bird was a special detail just for Potter, or only there because Potter had expected to see it. "You are beginning to build the bridge between us again. We wish to be in the covenant from the beginning, and secure alliance and protection."

Draco held his face immobile, but his mind was rioting with confusion behind the mask. "How did you know that I was building the bridge?"

The centaur paused and stared at him, though not as if he were stupid but simply because his answer was surprising. "Harry Potter reached out to us, and his mind was full of you," he said simply. "We know."

Draco nodded as though he'd expected that, but made a mental note to taunt Potter lately about his mind being full of Draco. "All right. Then you must know that I'm only in the beginning stages of building the bridge."

The centaur stamped his hoof. "Early is better than not at all. And you have a chance of constructing a bridge that endures."

Draco decided that it was time to move beyond discussion of the metaphor to discussion of practical endeavors, at least if the centaur would allow such a thing. "I would welcome your help. Who else should I reach out to? What else should I promise? Who needs to be my allies?"

"You can reach out to the merfolk and the unicorns and the dragons later." The centaur leaned forwards insistently. "You should promise us protection and aid, and the fostering of children."

Draco blinked, thrown off as much by the directness as anything else. He didn't realize how much he'd been braced for riddles and nothing else until he got this instead. "I-the fostering of children? Children coming to live in the Forest with you, and centaur-" He didn't know the correct term, and floundered for a moment before saying, "Children to live with us?"

"Yes." The centaur was stamping his front hoof, and it picked up speed as he considered Draco. "How can our people know each other if they do not live among each other from a young age?"

_How much do they really know? _"Indeed." Draco took a deep breath. "But I don't have any children to foster yet, or any place for a centaur to visit me. I'm not the leader of the Ashborn, just one person."

"Any person may become the center of an alliance, which in turn extends its tendrils to others," said the centaur dismissively. "There are two scholars among us who long for the ancient times to come again. They and their fillies are on their way to the fortress of the Ashborn."

"I don't _command _there!" The words were ripped out of Draco before he could stop them. "That's not-you can't possibly think that I can make space for them when Severus Snape rules the Ashborn."

"You will find a way," the centaur said. "You have the knowledge. Harry Potter has the will. Ask him to help you. He will find a place for the fillies to live, and for their mothers to stay with them as long as they wish. He defeated the Dark Lord that Mars said he should not defeat. One who challenges the will of the stars has little problem with the forces of the earth."

Draco closed his eyes and put one hand over his face. It was obvious that the centaur didn't understand the logistics of human organizations, or maybe he knew all about the ancient pure-blood culture and didn't have the slightest idea of what more modern pure-bloods were like.

_Although you know that you're not dealing with a group who can make their own decisions, as Potter would point out. You're dealing with one man. And Severus won't welcome these centaurs. _

If they were already on their way, however, Draco would have to deal with them somehow, even if it was only by turning them away. And for that, he would need Potter's help. He didn't dare go to Severus with this news, not without some sort of backup and clear evidence that it wasn't his fault.

"Very well," he said. "But don't blame me if Potter doesn't have the will, after all."

The centaur was gazing at him in wonder when he dropped his hand from his face. "Why would you speak as if you were independent of each other?" he asked, with another stamp of his hoof that sent leaves scattering and flying up. "You are allies. If he falls, you fall, and he must see that it is in his best interest to rescue you, as well."

Once again, all the many things he would have to explain choked Draco's tongue. He shook his head and said, "I'll try."

The centaur bowed his head, and the Forest faded from around Draco. He opened his eyes in his own bed and stared at the ceiling.

He didn't know how to deal with this. He had no idea how Potter would respond to it, let alone Severus.

But he found himself smiling, even if it was a thin and constrained smile.

_How long would have I have delayed about doing something, if I didn't have a goad? This way, at least, I can't pretend that there's no urgency, and I'll get around to it whenever Severus seems to be in a better mood._

_ This is the beginning of the change._


	7. Falling Stars

Thank you again for all the reviews!

_Chapter Seven-Falling Stars_

"I'll help you in any way I can."

That had apparently not been what Malfoy was expecting to hear, since he stared at Harry with his mouth open. Harry firmly bit his lip so that he wouldn't gape back in the same way-Malfoy would think he was being made fun of-and did his best to explain with quiet, firm words.

"That centaur told you that I had the will to make Snape agree to hosting the other centaurs. It's about time I put that will to use." _Since it's not been very good for fuck all so far. _

"But-" Malfoy brushed his hand across the corner of his mouth, glared down at his hand as though it had betrayed him, and then folded it firmly in his lap. "It isn't that," he whispered. "I expected you to help me."

_Liar. _Harry kept his expression bland, but inwardly, he was speaking the word in a loud, mocking voice. He wondered if Malfoy had any idea how alone he appeared, how much he needed help to walk the dangerous path he'd set himself on. Of course, fool that he was, he probably still thought he could depend on Snape, or the Ashborn that Snape had set to guard him, or some such.

"But I didn't expect this to happen so soon." Malfoy waved one hand around at the walls and collapsed into his chair again. They were meeting in Harry's room this time, and Malfoy had stared at the colors on the walls for five minutes, gaping, before he would start talking. Harry thought he would prefer that witless behavior to the way he was acting right now. "I don't know how I can face Severus. I don't know where we'll _put _them. And when Severus realizes that I don't plan to simply court a woman and have a child I can teach the ancient pure-blood ways, that it'll change the way he lives..."

"Oh, is that all?" Harry asked casually, feeling the scalding delight rise in him. "I'll be happy to talk to him about that, if you want."

Malfoy turned around and stared at him again. Well, good. Harry had his attention. He leaned forwards and began to speak, softly, all the words he'd wanted to say since the rape. If he waited for Malfoy to come up with counters to them, then he might never get the chance to say them at all.

"You're far more afraid of him than he deserves. Yes, he's magically strong and he commands the Ashborn, but he's a lesser person than you are, in every way. He's not aware of the outside world. He wants to live shut away from it, in walls that nothing can pierce. That's a sign of weakness. You give him power over you that he doesn't think he needs, but he _requires _it, to prop up his own wilting self-confidence. Withdraw it, and your relationship will change. You don't have to be afraid of him, because he'll be too afraid of you leaving him. Just stand up to him, once, and see what happens."

"You don't understand," Malfoy mumbled. "He has a power of withdrawing, himself. All he has to do is turn his head to the side and leave me behind with that cold indifference he practices so well, and-that's it. There's no way I can _fight _that, not when I've spent most of the past three years dashing myself to pieces on it. He'll be startled and angry when I fight back, but he'll ignore me until I give in."

Harry grinned at him. "You're smarter than I realized," he said, and watched the flush fill Malfoy's cheeks, the spark fill his eyes. _Good. He looks so much better that way than broken-down, cold and waiting for death. _"You recognize that much of the dynamic, at least. No, I agree that it can't change until you bring someone else in. That's why I volunteered in the first place."

Malfoy scoffed at him. "He'll do the same thing to you, and you don't have the patience to wear him down or the importance to him to force him to change."

Harry blinked, then realized that he hadn't told Malfoy about the way Snape had called Harry to him yesterday, or the results of that meeting. He laughed. Malfoy sat up further and glared at him. Harry took a moment to wonder why the expressions on Malfoy's face, and where he got those expressions and what he did with them, mattered so much to him.

"Sorry," Harry said, and choked on his own giggles. "But I irritate him to the point that he can't contain himself. I didn't tell you. Yesterday he offered to let me have some visits with my friends if I could bring his snake automaton to life. I did-it wasn't hard, really-and he made the promise, but in between, there was such anger as you've never _seen. _He can't think rationally about me. He wanted to throw things at me the entire time I was in there. He's far from the cool and pragmatic thinker that he's convinced you he is, or that _he's _convinced he is. Use me as a shield, if you need to, since his anger'll spill onto me, but I think that standing up to him, following my example, will also catch him off-guard."

Malfoy closed his eyes. "You know how much I long to be important to him," he whispered. "I never meant for you to see this weakness."

_Oh, for the love of small furry animals. _Harry placed his hand on Malfoy's shoulder and shook it until his eyes popped open and he shot Harry another glare.

"Enough of that," Harry told him crisply. "I feel sorry for you, sure, because I still think you were raped and can't admit it, and I'm sorry that you've lived in fear for so long. But that isn't the same thing as despising you. _Snape _despises you. He wants a compliant toy that still has enough free will to give him some titillating excitement when you're in bed."

"Fuck you, Potter!" Malfoy rose to his feet, his magic beating out around him for a moment like a heat shimmer. Harry still met his eyes fearlessly, though. He knew he was stronger than Malfoy was, and could land a harder blow if Malfoy attacked first and freed him from his Vow.

"Can't, I'm afraid," Harry said coolly. "You're so full of Snape fucking you up and over that there's no room for me."

Malfoy snarled, and his anger surged up from wherever he'd been hiding it. "You want pathetic?" he asked. "I'll tell you what's _pathetic. _The way you agreed to be our hostage, exactly as if you were the broken-down, spineless wreck that I thought you were in that first year for not being in Slytherin. You don't care about yourself, you don't care about living, you'll just crawl into the deepest hole you can find and martyr yourself while whimpering about how it's all for your friends-"

Harry laughed again. Malfoy stopped and stared at him. "Listen," Harry said to him, when he could talk around the laughter. "I agreed to this because I'm _used _to it, and because I was the one Snape asked for."

"You're used to it?" Malfoy's eyes blurred with confusion. "You were never a hostage during the war."

"Yes, I was," Harry said. "For a short time." _But still too long. _He bit the thought off ruthlessly and shrugged when Malfoy stared at him. "But what I really meant is that I'm used to being a tool. And Snape wouldn't have asked for anyone else, except as a chain to hold me in check. Better for me to become his hostage, so that he doesn't get _that _bright idea." He leaned forwards until his nose was an inch or two from Malfoy's. He was sitting on the bed, so there was a slight height difference between them, but Malfoy was the one who glanced away. "You're much more of a hostage than I am, held prisoner by your own fear. I'm not afraid of anything anymore. There's a limit to how much Snape can hurt me."

Malfoy stared at him, panting. Harry kept an eye on his hands, ready to dodge if Malfoy should lash out at him. He thought it entirely possible. Malfoy's fear and anger wasn't going where it should, to Snape. He had always had a terrible time blaming the right person, at least if the way he'd blamed Harry for his father going to Azkaban was any indication.

_God, that was only four years ago, wasn't it? _Harry blinked. The waste of time between then and now seemed large enough for a desert.

Maybe it was the blink, but Malfoy didn't hit him. He eased backwards instead and shook his head, his cheeks colored with a dull flush. "That doesn't matter," he said. "What _matters _is that I'm not going to say to Severus what you want me to say."

_Of course not, because that would be too simple. _Harry bit the inside of his cheek so that he wouldn't say that aloud. "I'm offering to help you," he repeated. "I'll stand between him and you. For now."

"Is that a threat?"

Harry stood up and left. There were all sorts of excuses to be made for Malfoy's behavior, but at some point they ran out.

He would visit the centaurs tonight, in his own dreams, and try to get a better sense of when the fillies and their mothers were arriving. That would let him know how much time he might have to prepare.

The same tall, thin Ashborn man Snape had used to summon him yesterday crossed his path before Harry could get back to the library. "Lord Snape requires you," he said, staring over Harry's head to meet Bellatrix's eyes. Harry didn't know what command he'd given her, but she stayed behind as they went to Snape's lab.

Harry rolled his eyes as he thought of the snake automaton and the reasons Snape might have summoned him. _If he wants to challenge me, then he's more than welcome to do so._

* * *

Draco sat in the library with his hands over his eyes, wondering for a moment if he should. If someone came in, and saw him sitting like that after a conversation with Potter, and reported it to Severus-

_But no one will do that, will they? _

No. They wouldn't. The Ashborn wouldn't notice him unless Severus commanded them to, Severus never came out of his lab this early in the morning, and Potter had walked away from him.

Draco bit the inside of his cheek savagely and shoved back his chair to hear the squeak. Then he walked rapidly through the corridors until he reached the garden he'd used to meditate in the other day, flung himself down on the bench where he'd also sat before, and stared around at the flowers growing in wild profusion.

_My mother would have loved this. _

Yes, she would have. Draco forced himself to inhale the clear air slowly, to notice the shining blue and the brilliant red and the shy pink of the flowers nearest him. He couldn't identify them all, he realized with a small start. He had paid attention to the parts of Herbology that involved magical plants he might have to use as Potions ingredients, but ordinary flowers had been beneath him.

_They aren't now. _

Draco reached out, hesitated, and then turned one of the blue flowers to face him. It grew with others on a large bush not far from the bench, and the head was heavy and covered with minute clusters of petals like confetti that had landed close together. Draco turned it back and forth, seeking some clue that would tell him exactly what it was, but finding nothing.

He lived in a world that he didn't know about, walked on earth he didn't recognize, was surrounded by flowers he couldn't name.

The idea hit him like a blow in the chest. Draco stood up and turned towards the library again. This time, he intended to find a book on Herbology and work with it until he could identify some of the ordinary flowers in the garden. It was a silly idea, but Severus wasn't around to say it was, and Potter had already promised to handle the arriving centaurs for Draco, if Draco would only let him.

It was worth it, at least for the moment.

* * *

"What did you need me for this time?"

Potter's tone was drawling, bored. He did not do it as well as Draco. Severus was glad to have found a weakness, although he did not speak of it aloud because Potter would pretend not to know what he was talking about, and Severus was tired of that.

"To give the automaton its commands," Severus said, and moved around to the other side of the table, so that he could watch from a better angle exactly what Potter did this time. Accompanied by Miguel, Potter walked up to stand near the snake's head. Severus touched Miguel's Mark with his mind and dismissed him. Potter appeared not to notice.

_One would not think he had been in battle, _Severus decided, and allowed his lip to curl.

"Interesting," Potter said softly, and looked up at Severus. "Did you command it to go back to sleep?"

_It's none of your business what I commanded it to do-_

Severus controlled himself between one breath and another, one blink and another. _No. _That question contained information that Potter could conceivably need, and the automatic response to it that Severus had produced was overblown. He _had _to gain better control of himself, and learn why Potter's blithe responses made him want to burn something.

"It went to sleep," he said. "Without my command." Enough words to answer the question and do nothing more. That ought to fulfill his mental condition of handling Potter with metallic neutrality. There were times that he could wish for the gleaming silver of his servants to replace his sparking thoughts and dashing emotions. It would be a more peaceful existence.

"Hmmm." Potter reached out and traced his fingers down the snake's blunt nose, hissing beneath his breath. The snake reared up at once, focusing on his voice. Potter stepped back to give it enough room to rise, his eyes locked on the glittering ones. He pitched the hisses upwards, or so Severus thought, locked in the mode where he tried to listen to as much as possible of a new language so that he might learn it more easily. The snake responded with a short, cut-off demi-syllable. Or so it sounded to Severus. He was not sure that Parseltongue had syllables in the way most human languages understood the term, and Potter would be useless in helping him learn more.

_Because it sounds like English to him when he speaks it. Not because you hate him. You must restrain that hatred as best you can, Severus. _

Potter shook his head and turned to Severus. "You made it for a specific purpose," he said, not quite hiding the sparks in the back of his voice or the way his eyes darkened. "It went to sleep again because you didn't give it orders that related to that purpose. It wants to be _used._" He glared at Severus under the fringe now, and with that scar hidden, the only difference between him and Lily was the hair color.

_And the shape of his face, and the glasses, _Severus told himself harshly. "You left yesterday before we could establish the orders."

"That doesn't matter," Potter said, while the sparks in the back of his voice caught fire. "It's still made for-_use. _It needs something more."

"Then give it the orders," Severus snapped.

Potter didn't move. "I want a definite time for the meeting with my friends."

"I have not yet chosen it."

Potter, infuriatingly, gave him a slight smile. "I know that. But I want to make sure that you choose it before I leave the lab."

Severus did not close his hands into fists. He would not allow himself _that _much indulgence. "I suppose that I will set a time of two days from now, in the morning, and you and your friends will meet in the large garden to the north of the fortress." The garden was completely enclosed, with several windows looking out on it, and would give Severus the ability to employ guards who could still be busy with other tasks, such as cleaning the corridors, while they watched. "Can you inform your friends of the meeting within that time-frame?"

"If you'll permit me the use of an owl, or a fireplace."

Severus narrowed his eyes, and said nothing. The strange request indicated that the boy had some other form of communication with them, one that Severus had not yet discovered. But arguing about it would waste more time, and if he was to understand his own reactions to Potter, then Severus thought he needed hours away from him.

Potter faced the snake again, his eyes narrowed in concentration. "You want it to guard your fortress," he said, his left hand raised as if he would stroke the snake, but not connecting to the swaying body. "How do you want it to discriminate between threats and visitors?"

"It is to attack anyone who comes into the fortress from the outside," Severus answered. That ought to be simple enough for Potter to convey in Parseltongue; perhaps only "fortress" would take a bit of explanation.

Potter turned and looked at him, movements heavier and more deliberate than those of many of Severus's automatons. "Including my friends? Including anyone coming in from the gardens?"

Severus closed his eyes, but a small spark of understanding had flared into life inside him, and had not burned him. He was used to a simple life now, with the only complicated things in his universe his spells and his potions, and not all of those. He had to keep seeking out more complexity, looking up more obscure incantations, entering the art of automaton-creation when he had not had any such desires at first, brewing potions that were almost beyond his abilities and inventing experimental ones that served less and less useful purposes.

He required challenges to keep from being bored. But he had given up finding them in people. The Ashborn were forcibly made simple; he could render Draco the same with a few carefully-chosen words.

Potter was new. Potter was complicated, challenging, unexpected, _different. _

Once, he would have rejoiced in that. But he rejected it. He feared it. He backed away in front of Potter and made sure that he had no access to the essential Severus, the core of wonder and intelligence that he carried in the depths of his mind.

He opened his eyes and looked back at Potter, who was still waiting for the orders he wanted to give the snake. Potter's eyes changed as he looked back, and Severus was glad to see it. Previously, those green eyes had been too much like deep pools under the shelter of some tall tree. Now there was a disturbance coming up in them from underwater.

Severus did not intend to show his own change yet. He said in a voice that was not different from the first one he had used, "You will tell it to attack anyone coming in from the outside unless they are Ashborn or unless they carry my magical signature."

Potter frowned. "How do you intend to establish your magical signature? It would have to be something the snake could sense."

Severus nodded and moved a step closer. Potter didn't flinch, though he did shift his stance slightly. This one would allow him to come up off the floor faster and strike from a variety of angles. Severus wondered if he knew he had done it.

"This way," Severus said, and spoke a long, slow spell that he had last used to give some of the automatons a way of distinguishing between him and a thief who might steal Potions ingredients. Long, swirling streams of violet and saffron formed between him and Potter, trailing about like wind currents. They snapped and shortened, and then wrapped around Potter. Potter's lip lifted from his teeth, but he didn't try to move until the spell had passed and the banners disappeared.

"That mingles your magical signature with mine?" Potter asked. He was trying to avoid picking at his arms, Severus thought, as though the spell had created scabs of dirt that covered him.

"It does," Severus said. "In scent form."

Potter wrinkled his nose further, but nodded and faced the snake, beginning a short, sharp series of hisses. The snake bent further towards him, head bobbing in what could have been parodies of human nods or simply something that could be read the same way. Severus leaned back against the wall of the lab and watched Potter engage with it, sometimes clenching a hand so that he could work some of the tension out of his fingers.

There was...

There was a newness in him as well. And a quiet, appalled realization of how much he had changed from the man he had been.

That man had had his alertness about him at all times, fooled only by habits of equally long standing, such as that of obedience to Albus or loathing of Potter. He had only rarely had to admit surprises, such as when a Hufflepuff girl turned out to be more competent in Potions than Severus had dismissed her as or when Potter managed to kill the Dark Lord as Albus had always predicted he would.

He had been happy to leave that man behind. After all, he had been a spy, a servant, a Potions master condemned to teaching children he mostly despised and kept from his true work. He had taken to the shaping of the Ashborn under the happy realization that now he _could _do his work, provided he created a set of people that would insulate him from the world. His whole life would be pleasure, with the potions and with Draco, and with short breaks into duty, such as when he had to take Potter hostage or give an Ashborn an order to resolve two conflicting imperatives.

But instead, his life had dissolved into pressure since Potter arrived. Arguments with Draco, inability to raise his newest automatons, internal debates of the kind that he had hoped to leave behind with the Dark Lord and the Light Lord.

This was not the way to the life he had wanted. He might have admitted that earlier, except that it was so hard for him to admit at _all _when he was wrong.

And that was not a rational action. If he was to be a supremely rational man, then he would have to change his mind and scan over the mistakes that had brought him thus far, locating the point where he could change them. He would have to interact more with the world, because that would, in the end, bring him greater comfort and pleasure than maintaining his isolation would have.

Albus had told Severus again and again that he could not have a happy existence by himself in the dungeons, that he was bound to crave for light and human company sooner or later, but the longer he put off the desire, the more savage it would be when it did recoil on him. Severus still curled his lip when he thought about the old man's wording, but...

In some ways he had been right.

_As always, old man._

"And done."

Potter was finished, then. Severus stood up and moved forwards to inspect the snake. Instead of coiling back into somnolence as it had done too soon after Potter's last visit, it nudged at the edge of his hands, flickered its tongue at Potter, and then silently slithered off the table and towards the door. Severus listened, and could hear nothing but the faint click and rasp, now and then, of a scale against the stone. The noise it made when moving had been his primary concern about its weaknesses as a defensive guardian.

"So, are you going to let me have an owl?"

Severus turned back to Potter. Potter watched him, waiting. No trace of fear.

_As always_.

"I will," he said. "There is a small owlery on the far side of the fortress, reaching towards the hills. I will tell Bellatrix to take your letter there."

Potter paused and blinked at him, uncertainly, as though he had expected Severus to refuse even this request even at this time. "All right," he said, and edged past Severus with another curl of his lip.

Severus watched him go. Potter the impulsive, Potter the brattish, Potter the impossibly incapable of respect, had nevertheless agreed to become a hostage, and he had done well enough to have survived more than a week among the Ashborn without prompting either of them to break their Vows.

Severus could take a lesson from that.

* * *

Harry leaned back from the letter and considered it for a moment. Then he nodded and rolled it up into a tight little scroll, which he sealed with a spell that he and Ron and Hermione had used several times to mark their letters when they were separated from each other during the war: a small curl of fire that left behind the shape of a rising flame in the sealing wax.

He thought he'd done a good job with the letter. It outlined the conditions that Snape was letting them meet under, and emphasized that he didn't think there would be danger.

If there was...

Harry let his fingers stroke his wand for a moment. Yes, ultimately the spell he'd used to take down Voldemort had worked on _people, _but he and Hermione had found another variation that worked on property, which he'd simply had no occasion to use. He could pull the fortress of the Ashborn down around their ears if he wanted to.

Then he shook his head. The far more likely outcome was that there would be nothing wrong or dangerous in the meeting, because Snape wouldn't be interested in retraining Ron and Hermione as hostages.

Smiling slightly at the thought of Hermione's reaction if Snape tried, Harry stood up with the letter in his hand and walked towards the door of his rooms. Snape had said that Bellatrix would take the letter to the owlery when he was done with it, but Harry intended to walk with her. Bellatrix wouldn't forget the letter along the way on purpose. On the other hand, she wouldn't have much choice if Snape told her to drop it or tear it up.

They had mounted several steps the color and size of flagstones-the first staircase Harry had seen in the fortress, since the Ashborn seemed to prefer to live all on one level-and there were the hoots and shrieks of owls above them, when Bellatrix abruptly stiffened and laid her hand on her wand.

Harry frowned at her. "What is it?" he asked. He didn't see what would make her look like that unless it was a summons from Snape, but he didn't know her _that _well.

"Magical creatures attacking the Ashborn," she said, and drew her wand free with a rasp, and whirled to rush back down the stairs. Harry hesitated for the briefest moment before he followed.

_Magical creatures. The centaurs. _

_ Oh, shit._

Well, he ought to be able to use magic to get ahead of Bellatrix, since he didn't intend to escape and the spell he had in mind wouldn't do any damage to the Ashborn. He ran his hand along the shaft of the wand and murmured the words that he had memorized when he and Hermione still thought that he'd have to battle all the Death Eaters at once before taking on Voldemort. "_Obiter._"

The world around him wavered. Then his feet left the ground, and his perspective seemed to turn sideways. He was flying, he was wavering like a mist, over the walls and down the stairs and in between them, passing through the inevitable cracks in the plain grey stones, seeking light.

The passing between stones was always surreal, no matter how many times Harry had done it. He found himself free and imprisoned at odd intervals, and now and then he could feel the sharp pinch of the rock around him, or veins in the stone, or flecks of crystal and quartz and mica. It was always hard to be sure what they were.

He burst out into the light with a gasp, and circled above the green grass. Magical signatures were visible to him in this form if he concentrated, as dim and misty auras of power. There were two off to the side that looked nonhuman-thicker and greasier-accompanied by two smaller, barely formed auras. Harry turned his wind-self in that direction, noting the magical signatures of Ashborn drawn up in front of them.

His landing would have to be more precise than the ones he'd practiced in the past. Well, he would do his best. He dived down until he was sure that he would land _somewhere _between the Ashborn and the centaurs, and then whispered a _Finite _that seemed to ripple throughout his body. He popped back into himself with a suddenness that made him shake his head.

At once sound and light and color pressed down on him. The Ashborn saw him appear and paused. No doubt Snape had ordered them not to harm him. Harry kept his back to them for a moment, instead regarding the centaurs.

Both of them were female, one a sorrel, one a bay. They were as calm and solemn as the white centaur Harry had met in his dream, although they did make sure that their bodies remained between the smaller centaurs and the Ashborn's wands. The fillies, Harry saw with a swift glance, were both chestnut, and they looked like five-year-old girls. Each of them ducked her head when they saw him looking, veiling their faces with bright auburn hair.

Like Ginny's.

Harry swallowed back the memory and faced the sorrel centaur, who he decided to address as the leader unless they corrected him. "May I know your names?" he asked. The fewer questions he asked that gave them room to answer confusingly or with riddles, the better off he thought they would be.

"Kleianthe," said the sorrel, touching her chest between her breasts. She gestured at the bay. "Thera." Then she put her hands on the shoulders of the fillies, pulling them both a little towards Harry until they gave in and bowed. "These are my daughter Starborn and Thera's daughter Cadmaea."

Harry nodded. "You came here because you wanted to?" he asked. "No one made you come?" His mind was working quickly, and he was sure that no matter what Malfoy's books said, magical creatures wouldn't function very well in a pure-blood alliance that their leaders had pressed them into.

Kleianthe smiled at him. She had brown eyes, bright and generous and warm. Harry decided to look at them. It would keep his eyes away from places they shouldn't be. "Yes, we came," she said. Her voice had a crisp sound, like hooves crunching through leaves in the Forest, Harry reckoned. "We want the old alliance as much as you do."

"Uh," Harry said, deciding that this wouldn't be the best time to tell them that he hadn't read the books Malfoy had and was filling in for him instead.

Then the nearest door of the fortress banged open and Snape stepped out, robes billowing around him, face flushed. Harry felt a smile struggling to work its way across his face even as he realized that Snape was probably on the edge of snapping and just ordering the Ashborn to exterminate everyone. He looked more human than Harry had ever seen him, less controlled.

Which might mean that Harry could control _him_, in the end.

"What is the meaning of this?" Snape was trying to make his words roll like thunder. It worked on the Ashborn, who swayed on their feet. Harry noticed that Kleianthe and Thera looked absolutely unimpressed, although their daughters hid behind them again.

"We have come to reestablish the old alliance," Kleianthe said. "The old protectorate," she added, perhaps to clarify, since Snape wore a stony expression and no other sign of response. "This time, we wish to be the ones that you speak to first, instead of the merfolk. They dominated the alliance last time."

He could get along with Kleianthe, Harry thought. She seemed the only centaur he had ever met, other than Firenze, who talked in a way he could understand. "Then let me make you welcome, formally, to the Ashborn," he said. "I will defend your lives with my life."

He didn't know if those were the right words; he had only chosen them because they sounded as if they should be. But the air between him and Kleianthe whirled abruptly into light. Harry blinked, wondering if someone else here knew the passage-spell he had used to get outside and was employing it right at the moment.

What came out of the star-shape forming between them was a pair of chains, however, small and delicate ones of the kind that someone might wear as a necklace. They fell at Harry's feet with a clank. He picked them up and stared at them. Both of them seemed to be made of iron, but iron so lightly made that they didn't feel heavy in his hands.

"You have spoken the words," Kleianthe said, and there was a song in her voice. She slid to kneel on one foreleg, bowing her head, and Thera did the same. Harry only noticed for the first time, as he stared at their lowered faces, that they were wearing bows slung over their shoulders. "And the ancient agreement has produced new signs." She reached out one wrist, splaying her fingers towards Harry.

After a moment, Harry realized what she wanted, and his face flushed as he looped the chain carefully around her wrist. The iron circlet closed, and the two links that ended it joined together, with no sign that they had ever been apart. Harry started to hold the other one towards Thera, but she shook her head and pointed her chin at him.

Harry put the chain around his own wrist, and it joined and fused in the same way.

_Er. I reckon I did something more than just welcoming them._

"Do you realize what you have done."

It wasn't a question, Harry thought as Snape stepped forwards. Snape already knew the answer, so there was no reason to ask a question. Harry watched him and saw the way his hand had fallen to his wand, which he pulled free of his robes without haste. His eyes were on Kleianthe and Thera, and the fillies. He probably thought they would be less trouble to kill than the adult centaurs.

"Welcomed them into a new alliance," Harry said, and held up his head as Snape's gaze snapped around to stare at them. What, had he not expected Harry to know that much? Harry had thought it was clear in his words. "Malfoy told me that pure-blood wizards used to be allied with magical creatures." Never mind that he didn't know exactly how. He was sure that it was more than Snape had known, or at least paid attention to. "And now that we have these symbols-" he brandished the iron chain on his wrist "-they need to be made welcome here."

Snape's nostrils flared. He said nothing for long moments. Then he said, "I will let them go, if you step back into the fortress now and prepare to make another set of Vows to me."

Harry understood what he'd done, then, and a smile of vicious delight broke out on his face before he could stop it. Snape narrowed his eyes as he stared at him, and Harry beamed right back, madly. Yes, he was more than willing to fuck up Snape's day if he could.

"I promised my life to defend them," he said. "And you can't actually kill me, can you, unless I attack first? I'm too valuable a hostage."

"There is pain I can cause you that does not depend on dying." Snape held up a hand and motioned, and Harry didn't know why until he heard the crunch and sway of the Ashborn behind him, moving forwards as one.

_Utterly _as one, with no chance of being different than their neighbors, Harry thought in disgust. He shook his head at Snape. "If you torture me, then I can strike back, and the Vows won't stop me. And I've said it before, you just don't seem to absorb the message in the right way. _I'm not afraid of you._"

"_Legilimens."_

Harry didn't think Snape meant for anyone else to hear that, it was whispered so softly, and of course the Ashborn wouldn't care if they did. The centaurs were the nearest audience, and Thera took a step back, her eyes flickering warily between him and Snape. Kleianthe gave a snort that seemed to originate deep in her chest and edged closer, pawing the ground with one hoof as if on the edge of a charge.

Harry didn't move. The spell had the effect he knew it would, briefly slicing into his tangled mass of memories and then recoiling from them. Snape's face turned pale. Harry wondered if anyone else here understood how revealing that was.

_Of course, Malfoy would probably understand even better than I would. _But he wasn't here at the moment, or at least wasn't watching their little duel openly, so Harry wouldn't invoke him and remind Snape of his existence.

"I told you," Harry murmured, barely moving his lips. "You can't do that to me, either."

Snape's hand tightened on the wand. Harry thought he would lash out, for a moment at least, and he readied himself for that. Defensive spells bubbled and churned in his mind. He would protect the centaurs first, as the ones he had invited to this little meeting, and then raise a shield that would bounce most of the curses that Snape could fire at him-

Then Snape said in a hollow voice, "Do what you will. You cannot respect the laws of hospitality. It should not surprise me that you cannot respect the normal rules of social interaction." He gave a mocking little bow to the centaurs and whirled aside, throwing swirls of dust into the air. He motioned to the Ashborn on his way past, and they turned around and followed him back inside-all except Bellatrix, who stood to keep a watch over Harry like always.

Harry blinked, licked some of the dust off his lips, and turned back to the centaurs. He thought he knew why Snape had given up so easily. He didn't want to humiliate himself in front of any more people who could _see _him being humiliated, and with the arrival of the centaurs, that number had gone from two to six.

_Or from one to five, at least. I don't know if Malfoy really counts when he'll still do his best to ignore everything that might lower Snape in his eyes. _

"If you'd come with me, ladies?" he murmured. "I'll find a place where you can shelter, and if you'll tell me what you need to eat, then we can see about providing that, too." The Ashborn's fortress was seated on a flat plain, surrounded by spells to keep Muggles from noticing when they flew over, and the plain was covered with grass, but Harry had no idea if that was the kind centaurs ate or not. Or did they even eat grass? Maybe their stomach was a horse's, but their mouths were human.

"No need to call us ladies," Kleianthe said, trotting up beside him. "We are allies now." She eyed him sideways. "And that was impressive, what you did."

"Defied him to his face?" Harry smiled a little as he started to lead them along the side of the fortress, Bellatrix following with huge eyes. "Yeah, I don't think he's used to that."

"Promised your life to defend us," Kleianthe said. "That is something that the old alliances required, but which we did not expect."

"Oh," Harry said. He hoped that he didn't look as stumbling as he suspected he did, but then again, Kleianthe was wearing an iron chain around her wrist that he had somehow conjured out of thin air with the right words, and she didn't _seem _unimpressed. "Er. Yes. I couldn't let him hurt you."

"He would have."

Harry breathed out and slowly nodded. "Yeah, I think so."

He started looking for sections of the fortress wall that had vines and trees rising above them. Those would be the gardens, and the places where the centaurs would probably want to stay even if they couldn't graze; they were outdoors and open to the wind and the stars. As for the rest, he would most likely have to find Malfoy and get his help, somehow.

_If he wants to help me after what I did to Snape._

_ Then again, I suspect that Snape won't exactly tell him the full story._

* * *

Severus kept walking until he found a small, cool room that none of the Ashborn would enter without his express permission; he used it to store Potions ingredients that could not be kept in the warmer environment of the lab. He pressed his back against the wall and watched the lightning dance against his eyelids.

Potter had challenged him to his face.

And got away with it.

Severus's hand worked up and down his wand with a slow, crushing motion. He knew he would not break the wood or damage the core inside; it was a substitute for what he would have liked to do to Potter's throat.

_I must find some way to conquer him. _

He did not know how or when that would happen. He only knew that it must.

* * *

Draco bit the heel of his hand and slumped against the wall. He hadn't been able to look away from the window through which he'd seen the confrontation between Severus and Potter until it was finished.

And now his mind was in a riot of conflicting emotions.

_He hurt Severus._

_ I didn't know someone could _do _that._

_ I hate him._

_ He did something I would never have dared to do._

_ He did something I should have done when he welcomed the centaurs and volunteered to stand up to Severus._

Out of all the raging truths, out of all the different and sharp-toothed options, only one stood out to him as something he had to acknowledge beyond all denial.

_ I don't know what comes next._


	8. Sharing the Days

Thank you again for all the reviews!

_Chapter Eight-Sharing the Days_

"And this does not inconvenience you?"

Harry shrugged and held out the tray of cornflakes and toast to Starborn and Cadmaea. Both of them murmured thanks and retreated with it to the far corner of the gardens. They were less shy around him than they had been, but Harry didn't think they had ever seen humans before they came here, so it wasn't a surprise they would want to spend most of their time away from him. "Inconvenience in what way, Kleianthe? I have to carry the food here for you, that's true. I can't rely on the Ashborn to do it." Or to do anything else, lately, except bring him the one tray of food.

Kleianthe considered him with a carefully flicking tail. Thera was several feet away, chewing tender bark off one of the trees in the garden. The adult centaurs could live on horse fare with human food thrown in for variety, they'd explained to Harry, but their children needed meals that were easier to digest. "They give you no more than this?"

_Oh._ Harry held her gaze and shrugged. "I have enough to survive." And he did. Although Snape had ordered Bellatrix to feed him only as much food as she had before, which meant Harry had to give the centaurs his portion, he'd concealed enough scraps of food in his room that he could survive on them for a few days. And it was no worse than the rations he'd had at the Dursleys.

He was going to have to figure out another strategy soon, but that was something he'd always been good at doing. He wasn't worried so much about his own survival as doing something that would mess up the new alliance with the centaurs.

"Everyone here seems most severely unwelcoming," Kleianthe murmured, and placed several blades of grass that she'd plucked earlier into her mouth. "Even the one that Sidereal told us knew about the alliance and would extend his hospitality to us."

Sidereal, Harry had decided from the other mentions she'd made of him, was the white centaur. He snorted. "Yeah, I thought he would. But he seems to have decided to hide in his bedroom and pout." He hadn't seen Malfoy anywhere in the corridors of the fortress since the moment he overcame Snape.

"He does not wish us here, then?" Kleianthe's eyes were bright, piercing, and she leaned forwards as if she would peer into Harry's face and draw the truth out of him with that long stare.

"I don't know," Harry said. It seemed impossible to him, to predict what Malfoy would do next. Sometimes he thought Malfoy must have been humiliated by his own fear of Snape and Harry taking the part in the alliance that should be his; sometimes he thought Malfoy preferred the centaurs to exist in the world of books and meeting them outside that was beyond him. Or Malfoy could have thrown the whole thing up and decided to squirm back under Snape's protection. Harry declined to speculate until he had some solid evidence.

Kleianthe studied him, the tops of her human ears flicking back and forth, now and then lying flat, the way they would have if they were horse ears. At last she nodded, seeming satisfied. "You do not yet know how he means to move," she said, and dipped her head to snatch more grass, speaking through her chewing this time in a way that somehow didn't blur the words at all. "That is well. I would be more worried if you were not being honest with us."

Harry eyed the great hooves, more than twice the size of his outstretched palm, that moved through the grass near him. "So would I."

"I would not kick you to death," Kleianthe said, following his gaze to her hoof. She was quick at reading his thoughts, something that had so far troubled Harry more than a bit. "I would do something else more subtle but that would make you regret lying to me, and then Thera and I and our daughters would return to the Forest."

Harry licked his lips. "I'll keep that in mind."

"That is not a threat, either," Kleianthe said, hide shuddering as though she was fighting off a fly. Harry hadn't seen any flies around since he entered the fortress, though, so it was probably directed at him. "Not even a warning. It was-"

"A prophecy?" Harry finished, giving her a sweet smile. If she could say things that unnerved him, he would return the favor.

After a moment during which she looked at him through eyes that Harry couldn't read the emotions in, she snorted and nodded. "Yes, if you like."

Harry went back into the fortress far more relaxed than he'd come out of it. So Snape wasn't giving him enough food to feed their guests as well as himself. He would find a way around that problem. At least the alliance between him and the centaurs seemed to be holding firm for now-though he wasn't sure why he should want it to, when Malfoy was really the one who cared about the future of the pure-blood connections with magical creatures-and he didn't mind if Snape and Malfoy kept out of his way.

And the meeting with his friends was this afternoon. The owl had come back with the messages from Ron and Hermione far quicker than the snake had. It was going to be a good day.

Harry was whistling as he reached the door of his bedroom and laid his hand on it. By now, he could almost ignore Bellatrix trailing after him. A quick meal of scraps of meat and dried fruit, and then he would consider some of the things he _had _to tell Ron and Hermione and the questions he most wanted to ask-

"Potter."

_That's the end of my holiday, _Harry thought in resignation, turning around. "What do you want, Malfoy?" _Finally emerged from your hiding hole? _he added in the privacy of his head, but he decided there was no real reason to say it. If Malfoy wanted to be an ungrateful prick, then let him.

* * *

Draco came to a stop when he saw the way Potter was glaring at him. For some reason, he had dared to imagine that the bastard would actually be _pleased _to see him, but-

_He isn't. He won't be._

Draco felt anger swell his veins like blood, giving him the courage he needed to face Potter, the courage that had been sadly lacking ever since he watched Potter take Severus apart from the window two days ago. He said quietly, without moving from where he stood, "Did you think that I would allow you to take my place with the centaurs in the alliance?"

Potter didn't splutter, didn't turn red or blink or any of the other signs that Draco was looking to indicate that he understood what he had done. He nodded instead and asked, "Does that mean that you're going to take over sheltering them and talking with them and feeding them? Because the Ashborn might give you more food for the fillies than they've given me."

"_React, _damn you!" Draco snapped before he thought about it. "Or do you care about nothing but what's in front of you at the moment?" He surged forwards, not pinning Potter to the wall only because he kept a thin hair of space between their bodies. "Are you as suicidal as you protested to me that you weren't, and you can go from topic to topic and emotion to emotion without blinking, because nothing matters to you?"

"Look down, Malfoy." Potter's whisper coincided with the jab of something sharp against Draco's ribs.

Draco did. Potter's wand rested beneath his ribs, and it jabbed again as Draco watched, sinking into the yielding skin, jolting on bone.

"I care about getting you free of Snape's bloody tyranny," Potter said, his breath washing over Draco's face in heated puffs. "I care about making sure that the centaurs don't get hurt because they were stupid enough to trust you and actually come here. I care about my friends, and seeing the Ashborn free, and finding a way to exist here and accomplish what I want and care about without breaking my Vows. So sorry that the thrashing, fighting Gryffindor on a hook you wanted only exists in your head." He gave Draco a mean smile.

Draco pressed closer against him, feeling Potter's ribs now, his chest, the bones that projected up from his hips and pelvis and shoulders. He was nothing, skin and bone, _nothing _to hurt Severus like that and make Draco feel as if he were falling downstream with a river in flood. Nothing to make Draco feel out of control for the first time in years.

If Potter hadn't come here, he wouldn't have questioned his relationship with Severus. He wouldn't be the way he was now, his mind flailing away from all the books he tried to concentrate on and the small goals he tried to set-even the ones that couldn't matter to anyone but him, like picking up a book of Herbology to learn the flowers in the garden-and focusing again and again on Potter and the centaurs.

Potter had humiliated Severus. And whatever Severus had done to Draco himself, never mind that the Ashborn wouldn't notice a thing Severus didn't tell them to notice, that still hurt. Someone had to avenge it.

"You can still be hurt," Draco whispered. "If what you're saying is true and you care about all those things. When your friends come here, I can hurt them."

Potter's wand sank deeper into his side. "I know a spell," he said, voice no longer a whisper but a simple, normal conversational tone, so that someone coming down the corridor could have understood them easily. "It's called the Vampire Curse."

Draco laughed. "Do you think I'm afraid of being turned into a vampire? Severus has potions that could change me back-"

"No, it's named for what it does," Potter said. "Drains all the blood from your body and leaves you a corpse in seconds. And that's what I'll do to you if you harm Ron and Hermione. You won't have more than a second to realize what's happening, either. It's that quick." He paused. "_I'm _that quick."

"A swift, painless death?" Draco sneered at Potter, and thought he could feel his canines growing as he had denied to Potter would happen. "That's not something I thought you would give someone who had gone so far as to hurt your precious friends."

"The war changed me," Potter said simply. "I've learned that it doesn't matter how I kill people. Just that I do."

Draco took a step away from him, unnerved despite himself. _Severus's honor, _he remembered, and came up with another tactic. "And what if I go back to Severus, and tell him that he can do anything he likes with me? That would hurt you, wouldn't it. If I stopped caring about my own freedom."

"You could try," Potter said. "But I could mercy-kill you, too, if I saw you suffering from continual rapes and you were so deluded as to think that was something you chose."

Draco spat at him. Potter reached up and wiped it off his face with no sign of disgust, then cast a spell that Vanished it from his skin.

"I want to live, and I want to be with Severus," Draco said, trying desperately to think of a way to hurt Potter. That was the most infuriating thing about him, even more infuriating than the way he had impugned Severus. He couldn't be hurt. He didn't fear death and he had an answer to everything Draco tried to bring up.

"Then go and do so," Potter said. "And stop bothering me as though there's a real reason for you to want to change." He opened his bedroom door and stepped inside, leaving it open only long enough for Bellatrix to follow. She'd stood by during his entire argument with Potter, Draco realized dimly, as though it was nothing to her if Potter died in front of her.

Or if Draco did.

_No. She would have intervened if he hurt you. She would have to._

But only because Severus would have compelled her to. Or the orders he had woven into her brain would have compelled her to.

There was no one, Draco realized in that moment, simply and brutally, who saw him for _him_, who cared for him because of who and what he was. He had thought Severus came close, but that indifference he knew how to wield so well cut deeply here. And the Ashborn would only pay as much attention to Draco as Severus required them to. He had built in slavish, cringing adoration for _himself_. Nothing for Draco.

Potter had spoken to him, but even he was convinced that Draco was so incapable of making his own decisions that he wouldn't know what rape was when he saw it.

The pain blew away in the face of an anger like a stormwind. Draco turned from Potter's door-because God forbid that anyone see him standing here like an idiot-and made his way back to his own rooms, already invested in new ways of making everyone else see him, instead of the simpleton they had turned him into in their own thoughts.

No one would change things for him. Potter's efforts were driven by pity. Severus wouldn't care if Draco fell to his death tomorrow, except that he would have to find someone else to fuck. The Ashborn...he had already stated the problem with the Ashborn.

But there were other creatures in the fortress that he could make himself matter to now.

And if he had to appeal to centaurs to achieve some level of power and importance, then he would do that.

* * *

Severus settled back in his seat and closed his eyes.

So withholding food would not break Potter, or his alliance with the centaurs. He fed the food he received to the young ones, and he did not complain of hunger. Of course, perhaps he would not, thin as he was and with a face that spoke of prolonged starvation during the war.

There was something else needed to conquer him, something else Severus did not yet see.

His frustration tried to rise like bile, boiling hot, and overwhelm him. He shook his head and dismissed it. That had been the way he'd reacted to Potter so far, childishly, with limited emotional capacity to do anything but rage. Potter had bested him so far not because he was inherently more intelligent but because he simply held his emotions in check better.

Severus would go further. He would analyze Potter's weaknesses and break him in the end. Potter would lose the advantage because he did not seek to do the same thing. He was always, simply and endlessly, thinking about Severus only when confronted with him. His great fault had always been not paying enough attention to his enemies when they were not in front of him. He had lived like a normal teenager during the war, not like someone who should be training for battle. Severus had been amazed by the way he acted when he broke rules, not because it was so impossible that a Gryffindor and the sainted son of James Potter should break rules, but because Potter of all students should be thinking of bigger and better things.

He settled back in his chair and held out his hand. The hound automaton was there immediately, bearing a glass of cooled water on its flattened hands. Severus sipped from it and focused his thoughts.

So. Potter's intermittent concentration on his enemies had been enough to slay the Dark Lord. What did he think about Severus? How could Severus take advantage of the boy's obliviousness to his existence?

A small smile lifted the corners of his lips a moment later, and he nodded.

The answer was simple, when he thought about it. Not thinking about Severus meant the boy would also not be considering the unique forms of danger Severus could present because of his skills. If the boy had paid any attention to experimental Potions over the last several years, then Severus would be surprised. And even if he had, he would not know which potions Severus had invented, since he sent them into the world under an assumed name, and which ones he merely had access to.

Severus could make the boy suffer from small doses of potions administered to his food, his water, the walls of his room. He could make him sweat all night, render him unable to sleep, make him vomit until his stomach twisted out of his body. All of those treatments would leave Potter alive to continue to serve as a valuable hostage, and none of them were so subtle that the boy would be unable to pinpoint them on his enemy eventually. Thus Severus would assert his authority, his ability to affect the air Potter breathed and all the time he spent in the Ashborn fortress.

Severus rose to his feet with a tight smile.

He would end the starvation Potter had experienced tomorrow. And he would choose his first potion with care.

* * *

Harry leaned against the wall and took a few deep breaths. Bellatrix stared at him, probably because she thought them a precursor to an attack, and Harry shook his head and smiled at her.

"Just trying to remind myself they're _here, _now," he said, even though he knew she wouldn't understand, and then opened the door and stepped inside.

The door led to a small garden, the one that Snape had told him they'd be meeting in. The air was filled with the scents of roses and honeysuckle, but Harry had no eye for flowers right now. His gaze locked on Ron and Hermione, as welcome as food in the summer, and he ran forwards and grabbed them both into a hug at the same time, dancing them in a circle.

Harry closed his eyes while Hermione said his name in his ear, over and over again, and Ron mumbled and swore and tried to show his emotion in socially acceptable masculine ways. He could feel his spine straightening as he held them, new plans and ideas flooding into his brain.

He had always thought better when he had his friends with him.

At last, they finished hugging and sat down at the chairs near the small round table that the Ashborn, or Snape, had set out for them. Harry was aware of Bellatrix staring at them and eyes from the windows nearby, but he didn't care. In fact, he shook his head when Hermione hissed something to him about speaking in front of Bellatrix. "She won't care about anything we say in and of itself, unless it threatens Snape. We just have to assume he's going to know anything we say here, and proceed accordingly."

Hermione looked sickened, but Ron nodded and plunged ahead. He didn't always get hung up on ethics as much as Hermione did. "So, mate. Why did he agree to this meeting?"

"Because I helped him animate a metal snake that he wanted to bring to life." Harry shrugged when they stared at him. "I know, but I don't pretend to understand him." He told them about the centaurs, since that was the thing he wanted to share most at the moment.

Hermione's eyes were shining by the time he finished. "A real alliance with magical creatures," she whispered. "I wish we'd been able to do that with house-elves." Then she hesitated. "Why did they never come to us when we tried to approach them, but they came at the call of a wanker like Malfoy?"

Harry shrugged. "They used to be allied to pure-blood wizards, and I think they see this as the continuation of that kind of alliance. Anyway, I don't think we're going to be doing anything grand any time soon. After all, the Ashborn don't have any children to foster the way that the centaurs are fostering the fillies here." He shuddered to think of the ways that Snape might breed the Ashborn if he decided that he wanted a new generation of servants.

A cold, quiet voice in the back of his head asserted itself. _There are things you can do to prevent that. You might not ever be able to reverse the mind control that he has on the adult Ashborn here; it's sunk in too deep and you don't know enough about Legilimency. But you can make sure that the children are free._

Harry nodded. He would do that, rather than stand back to see them grow up in slavery.

"Tell me about you," he said, changing the subject. It seemed to him that his world was small and sterile, with only the centaurs to blow through it like a fresh wind. And hearing the news from his friends on paper wasn't the same as hearing it from their mouths. "What have you done in the past week?"

"Tried to comfort Ginny," Ron said. "Played an awful lot of Quidditch. Told Mum you won't be coming back." Harry winced and nodded. None of them had broken the news to Molly before he left, because none of them had wanted the task. "Thought about ways to get you free."

"Mostly that," Hermione added.

Harry shook his head firmly. "I made Unbreakable Vows, and cramped and confined as this kind of existence is, I _do _still want to live. Please, if you can, visit me, but don't play around with wandlore or any of the things that you think might be able to free me."

"We can't," Hermione said, and abruptly her eyes were swimming with tears as she reached across the table and clamped her hand down on his. "Harry, you're meant to be free, with us, living a normal life. We can't stop thinking about that and working for it and fighting for it. Don't ask us to."

Harry sighed. He knew that look, and he knew that speaking to her about it would be futile.

"Fine," he said. "But you'll need to find some way that _doesn't _depend on me breaking the Unbreakable Vows. I know that I would die if I approached that, and I want to live, I told you."

Hermione's nostrils flared, but a moment later she nodded. Ron clasped Harry's hand and nodded, too.

"I hope we can work fast, and you can be with us before a year is up," he said.

Harry permitted himself one moment to live in hope, one moment to think about seeing his friends every day and learning to live with Ginny and eating whatever he wanted whenever he wanted to-

And then he laid the vision aside. He couldn't go on existing here, in the real world inside Ashborn walls, if he held onto it. He would dream himself to death. He had to believe that what he had done was valuable and important in its own right, or he would go mad with resentment that someone hadn't come up with a way to make his sacrifice unnecessary.

"That would be great," he said. He heard movement behind him, and saw Bellatrix shifting around. Their visit would be over soon. Harry reached out and held Ron and Hermione's hands even tighter, making himself memorize the feel of their calluses and scars and the ridges of their palms.

"I hope that I can see you again soon," he said. "But I don't know that I can. Keep on working on a way to free me, if you have to, but live your lives, too. I don't want to deprive you of that."

Ron leaned in to hug him again. Hermione waited her turn, and she said in his ear, "Are they going to hurt you once we're gone? You already look thinner and paler than you did."

Harry blinked, but whispered back, "I've been out of the sun, and Snape thinks that he can control me by depriving me of food."

Hermione's arms tightened around him, but she pulled back and gave him only a single grave look. "If you need help, then call on us," she whispered, and walked past and away with Ron, to the edge of the garden. Harry watched them go. He knew they would Apparate somewhere beyond the walls and he wouldn't be able to make sure they were gone and absolutely safe until he got a letter from them, but there was still no way he was looking at anything else as long as they were in sight.

Bellatrix started making the little shooing motions at him that she used when she thought he'd lingered in one area long enough. Harry nodded at her and started walking, trying to ignore the sensation of her eyes on his back. Where she looked, he could assume that Snape's brain was in control.

_I'm still here. I'm still alive._

_ And tomorrow I'll have to do something about the food, since I'm running out of what I've stored. But I have a solution to that, too._

* * *

"I have neglected to welcome you among the Ashborn so far," Draco said, with a bow that he knew was correct because he'd spent the entire afternoon studying books about the alliance with the centaurs that told him how to do it. There were plenty of books like that once he knew where to look for them. They simply weren't the kinds that had been in use at Hogwarts or valued in his parents' library, which meant that he had never learned from them before. "Please allow me to correct that mistake."

The centaur he spoke to, a sorrel mare with large breasts, studied him without speaking. She was also the one who wore the stupid iron chain around her wrist that Potter had conjured. Draco bit the inside of his cheek and, with effort, said nothing about that even though he wanted to. He rather thought that the effort would pay off later, when the centaurs began to change their allegiance from Potter to him.

The sorrel said, "I am Kleianthe." She didn't offer the others' names, which Draco knew from the books was a bad sign. She took a single, prancing step towards him, and swung her wrist around in front of her so that the sun gleamed off the links of the chain. "Why did you not approach us earlier?"

_More direct than most of the centaurs are supposed to be, as well. _Draco took a slow, deep breath. "Because I thought to assign the duties to Potter," he said. "He was the one who your lord first contacted."

Kleianthe smiled as if he had said something funny, though Draco didn't think his words could possibly have less grace than Potter's. Potter had said the right thing that conjured chains into existence out of pure _luck. _"And in the days since?" she asked. "It is two days since we arrived, and you have never come near us once."

Draco felt the part of him that was still his father's son rear up in furious pride. _I do not need to justify myself to a beast-_

But he could not think that way if the centaurs were to become his allies and his first chance of building a power base among the Ashborn that was independent of both Severus and Potter. He bowed his head and said, "That was my mistake. I would like to be known to you, however, and to your companions." He looked pointedly at the other centaurs, awaiting the introduction.

Kleianthe only trailed one hoof through the grass as if considering. Then she said, in a voice stern enough to mimic iron bells clashing, "Why was it your mistake? Why did you not come immediately?"

"I had other things to deal with," Draco said. "Matters relating to your comfort to study." There, that was true, given the books he had read, and the kind of dignified excuse that should impress them.

"So far, Potter has seen to our food and shelter and water, and promised to defend us with his life." Kleianthe studied him with her tail flicking. "What can you have to offer us beyond that?"

"Courtesy," Draco said, which he knew centaurs valued. "Trust. The beginnings of a true alliance. Time spent with you. Does he come at any time when he does not have food to deliver?"

Kleianthe smiled for the first time. "That is true enough. So. Tell us about the terms of the alliance that you will lay down. What other magical creatures do you intend to reach out to? How will you defer to them, or will you invite them here? What sort of gifts will you exchange? Will they be placed before us in the alliance?"

Draco didn't have to read the twitching of her ears to know the right response to that last question. Centaurs were touchy, and the histories he had read had taught him that they had always resented their secondary place in an alliance dominated by the merfolk. "No," he said. "I can promise you that much, no matter who we reach out to."

"But you have no plans as yet." Kleianthe nodded. "I would like you to visit the garden tomorrow morning with Potter when he brings our children breakfast, and then we can discuss the matter like friends."

Draco narrowed his eyes. "I had thought it was understood that I would be responsible for providing the meals for you from now on."

"For our daughters," Kleianthe corrected him. Her lip curled an infinitesimal amount, but Draco saw it. "They are the only ones among us who still eat exclusively human food. Besides, this is an _alliance. _You cannot act independently of each other, not when you issued a joint invitation. If you dislike each other or have conflicting goals, all the more reason for us to speak together."

_Fuck. _Draco wanted to respond with a curt refusal, but of course that would _also _damage his chances to grow a power base. He bowed instead, while his mind returned to the problems the books had talked about, and which he had hardly given thought to until now.

Of course the old alliances had functioned in a different way. He had known that from the beginning. And of course he had been shaken when he realized _how _different they were, but his shaking of old conceptions had not gone deep enough.

Kleianthe would see them both as bound to each other now, Potter and him, because Potter had got there first and offered his life and words of protection to the centaurs. Draco and Potter were supposed to negotiate, talk to each other, back down when a problem got out of hand and walk away-only to come back later. There was no sawing through these webs he wanted to spin simply because you were angry. The anger provided its own kind of sealing wax, said a book he had read today. You would become angry over the loss of someone you valued, not because a stranger who meant nothing to you had offered you insult. What did strangers matter? The world was your friends, your rivals, your allies, your trade partners, your family.

Draco swallowed the bitterness-healing potions were never meant to be sweet-and nodded. If he wanted that world, then he would have to work to create it, not a pale substitute.

"I will come tomorrow morning," he said.

* * *

_I can have meat without hunting? _

_Yes, you can. _Harry smiled at the small snake coiled around his wrist, who watched him with bright, doubtful eyes, flicking its tongue now and then. He'd sent Bellatrix away by the simple expedient of pretending to go to sleep. It seemed she didn't have orders to watch him when he couldn't possibly be plotting against the Ashborn. That was useful to know. _I'll feed you out of whatever you bring me from the kitchens. You know where the kitchens are? _In Parseltongue, that came out a bit like "cave of dead meat."

The snake's tongue flickered once as if uncertainly, and then it turned almost around and flicked it out strongly. _Yes. There. The smell of food is strong in that direction._

_Go and fetch whatever you want, then. _Harry turned his hand over, and the snake descended his arm to the floor. _Bring what smells good. _That might be a worryingly broad category, given the range of what snakes would eat, but, well, Harry knew some Cooking Charms and other useful spells after years of fighting. _I will prepare it for you and break it up in the way that you like. _He had discovered the snake enjoyed having him hand-feed it scraps rather than simply gulping down whatever might be in sight. It claimed that it had more chance to savor the taste that way.

_That doesn't sound like not having to hunt to me, _the snake complained, but slid away with a flick, of its tail this time. Harry watched it squirm between the stones and vanish. Then he lay down on the bed and closed his eyes. Bellatrix opened the door to check on him, but withdrew a moment later.

Harry had finally run out of scraps to feed on, but he had found a way around the problem as he knew he would. The snake could swallow far bigger things than it could carry, and hold them safe in its throat. It might have to take a longer route back to his rooms-some of the tiny tunnels through the stone that it used would be impossible with that swelling of the food to make the snake bigger-but it would get there eventually. Harry would snatch mouthfuls of food, more frequently than he'd been used to at the Dursleys', bigger than the mouthfuls he'd had often during the war.

That was the difference between what he'd suffered as a child and what he was doing now, he thought, somewhat smugly. He'd endured then, because he could do nothing else, at least until he had friends to send him food. Now he survived, and struggled, and fought, and won.

Someone knocked on the door.

Harry popped open his eye and studied the door. He knew it was probably Malfoy, come to continue their argument from earlier, but Harry could have done without seeing him right now. He didn't want to use up too much energy until he could get food to restore it, and sleeping seemed like the best idea.

"What?" he called.

"I need to speak with you about the centaurs," came Malfoy's clipped, snooty voice.

Harry sighed and stood up. If Bellatrix wasn't objecting, then he couldn't put off the whole conversation under the pretense of orders from Snape. "Right. Come in."

Malfoy slid in, and didn't gape at the painted walls this time. He sat down in the chair exactly as if Harry had invited him and crossed his legs. "I want to make sure you know that, from tomorrow morning, I'll be visiting the garden and feeding the fillies with you," he said.

Harry ran a hand over his face and thought about that. He could see it, in one way. It _would _be sort of nice if he fucking managed to hand over the care of the centaurs to the one they'd deigned to deliver their message to. "Does that mean that you'll be giving them food out of your share?" he asked.

Malfoy blinked. "What?"

"Oh," Harry said. _Of course not. Why would Snape restrict what his lover eats? _"Will you share in giving them food, is what I meant? I only have the one tray, and I've been giving it away to the fillies. If you gave them some food as well, I could keep some of it."

* * *

Draco stared at Potter. _Severus hasn't increased his meals since the centaurs arrived? _

Well, no, Draco realized slowly. Severus would see it as the perfect way to control someone he had no particular love for. He had likely expected Potter to yield and plead for mercy long before now.

Draco...didn't know how he felt about that. For some reason, even though it was the perfect tactic for Severus to use, and Potter the perfect stubborn one to fight it, it wouldn't have occurred to him.

"I can give them part of my meal, yes," Draco said. "I should, if I want them to respect me as well as you, and give me a part in the alliance," he added, and didn't care if it was the haughty edge to his voice that made Potter curl his lip. Potter bloody well _deserved _that haughty edge. "The alliance that _I _told you about."

Potter rolled his eyes. "Fine. We've settled that. We'll meet in their garden in the morning when my meal gets served and I can take it to them. Now, was there anything else?" He looked back at his pillow as though it was calling him.

_I'm not important enough to pay attention to, not unless I'm doing exactly as he wishes me to and calling any sex with Severus rape. _The boiling anger that he wanted to pour on Potter's head wouldn't earn him special consideration, though. Draco snorted in several deep breaths and then said, "I want to know why you didn't protest about Severus depriving you of meals."

Potter's return glance sleeted over him, incredulous. "Because he wanted me to complain," he said. "And because I'm not soft enough to whine over a little thing like that."

Draco shifted in place on the chair. "That's bravado," he said, but ruined his own claim by hearing his voice climb at the end of the words, as though asking a question.

Potter shrugged and moved away from him, climbing back onto the bed. "It's not," he said. "But if you want to think it is, then I certainly can't stop you." He shut his eyes. "Now, unless you think that watching me sleep is going to be interesting, you really should leave." He shut his eyes firmly and curled up on his side, his breath whistling our softly as though he was already halfway to dreams.

Draco shook his head and stood up. "A word of advice, Potter," he said. "Severus has played more power games than you've ever dreamed of. He won't let you get away with defying him."

Potter didn't bother saying anything, just lay there. Draco clenched his teeth down. Very well. Potter wouldn't listen to him when he tried to offer honest advice, either. This way, at least he couldn't say that Draco hadn't warned him.

He slipped out of the room and returned to the dining hall, already making plans about what he should select in the morning to tempt the centaur fillies. Potter had offered whatever came his way, no doubt, depending on the whims of Severus and the house-elves. Draco was sure that they would like sugar and fresh fruit better than cornflakes, though.

He might have a chance to create a meal tempting enough that they would start trusting him before they did Potter. Draco knew he had a small, hard smile on his face as he began to make a list, and he didn't care. This was the only route to power that offered itself right now, and he would walk it, no matter how long it took or where it led in the end.

* * *

The snake slipped in at last, after Harry had almost given up hope of him, but Harry had to distract Bellatrix by flailing and kicking in the bed and pretending that he'd had a bad dream. The snake slid through the open door while her back was turned and darted under the bed.

Harry finally "came awake," panting and flipping sweat-soaked hair out of his eyes, and shook his head at her when she tried to cast a diagnostic charm on him. "I'll be fine. Thanks, though."

Bellatrix tapped her wand against her leg and eyed him. Harry tried to look the pattern and picture of innocence, and she finally turned away. Harry didn't know what thoughts were churning in that Snape-controlled morass she called her brain. He didn't think that he could call them "thoughts," even, not when she didn't have any choice about them being there.

The snake eased back out and opened its jaws, dumping most of a chicken on the bed. Harry chuckled and began casting the spells that would clean it off-thoroughly-and cook it. His mouth already felt wet, and he knew that he would need discipline to share the scraps with the snake.

In the end, the snake coiled around his wrist and stared at him, so it wasn't that hard after all. Harry made sure he ate slowly, ignoring the demands of his screaming stomach. He had been hungrier than this before, and he'd also been sick and thrown up the food. That was no way to handle his first full meal in two days.

The snake ate more than enough chicken to satisfy it, and then lay down on the pillow and watched Harry devour the rest. Harry stored the bones in a Stasis Charm under one corner of the deep, downy blanket. He knew spells that could crack them open so he could find the marrow. He'd done that more than once on the run, too.

_You are careful, _the snake said.

_Had to be, _Harry said drowsily, and let his eyes slip shut so that real sleep could overcome him this time. _But tomorrow, there might be more food. _

That hope made for very pleasant dreams.


	9. Power Plays

Thank you again for all the reviews!

_Chapter Nine-Power Plays_

"Our thanks."

That was all Kleianthe said before she ripped into the food that Draco had brought, a delicate sundae of cream and chocolate that she didn't want to share with her children, but Draco had noticed she hadn't given Potter that much. Or perhaps she meant to share the thanks with both of them.

Draco looked over at Potter triumphantly, but he was watching the fillies gambol with a fond smile that meant he probably hadn't even heard Kleianthe. Draco set his jaw. This would have been easier with a rival for power who _noticed _when his power base was shifting and might be stolen from underneath him.

But Kleianthe had paused in her eating of chocolate and was staring at him, so Draco reckoned it was up to him to make the first move in their "conversation." With any luck, Potter would react scornfully and the centaurs would that he was permanently ill-natured and there was no use trying to include him anyway. "I think we should talk," he said.

Potter smiled without looking at him. "It sounds like you're chewing on a mouthful of your own teeth when you try to say that, you know," he murmured.

Draco clasped his hands and rolled his eyes up at the heavens, not so much praying for strength as showing Kleianthe that he was trying, truly he was, but it simply wasn't enough. "We need to speak about more than your hatred of Severus and your hatred of me," he said.

"Then let's," Potter said, and moved on before Draco could reflect to that ground-stealing tilt. "For one thing, are you going to dream of and reach out to more magical creatures? I could, I reckon, but I'm not sure I'll be good at it. And it might upset Snape more than it's worth, to bring some of them here."

"You would need very large reserves of water for the merfolk to visit, let alone live here," Kleianthe said with a nod, and swallowed the last of the chocolate, then licked her fingers, completely unselfconscious. Draco could only wince and decide that the centaur version of polite table manners didn't match up very well with its human equivalent. "That is one reason not to reach out to them immediately."

"You're right," Potter said, with a seriousness that made Draco shake his head. _One moment he admits uncertainty, the next he acts as if he knows all about it. _"And I wouldn't have thought of it. That's another reason I need your help to make the decisions." He turned and stared at Draco, drumming one hand lightly on his leg.

"This is only a game to you," Draco said. If Kleianthe wanted Draco to be honest about the state of the alliance between himself and Potter, then he would, although he doubted this was the kind of honesty she'd had in mind. "It's not to me. It's more than that, and it always will be. This is my _life._"

Potter shrugged. "If you tell me what I should do next, I'm willing to listen, as long as it doesn't involve hurting my friends or breaking my Vows. There's not a whole lot I can promise other than that."

"I mean," Draco said, and he knew his teeth were grinding and for once he didn't care, "that you don't take me _seriously. _You see me as an obstacle or a child to be humored. How can we make any sort of alliance at all between other kinds of creatures if we can't make you take me seriously as a _human _ally?"

Potter was staring at him as if he'd never seen him before. Draco folded his arms and sneered back. At least that was a beginning, a pointer towards the final step of getting Potter to notice him at _all_.

* * *

_Well. That makes sense. _

Harry still didn't think he was wrong that Snape was mistreating Malfoy, and Malfoy was making excuses for it because he thought Snape was a hero and the one who had protected him from a much worse fate. But in that case, attacking Snape would only make Malfoy more and more loud and defensive, Harry thought. He should do something else instead, something that would make Malfoy likely to listen to Harry in the first place instead of snapping up defensive walls.

"I'm sorry," he said. "But one of the reasons I can't take you seriously is that you keep swinging back and forth between emotions. One moment you want to talk to me as an ally, then you appeal for help, then you tell me I'm an idiot and threaten to kill me. What is it you _want_?"

Malfoy's hands slowly closed into strong fists, as if he wanted to punch Harry but the desire was coming on him slowly. Harry stood there, watching his hands, his brain whispering to him about the right places to jump. He had no desire to hurt Malfoy, especially not in front of the centaurs. But he wasn't willing to be a punching bag to satisfy Malfoy's inconsistent wishes, either.

"I want _respect_," Malfoy said. "Your notice. A reaction from you besides a calm look and an insult that rattles me while never touching you."

Harry shifted from one foot to the other. The words went into him like a bolt of lightning, eerily similar to something Hermione had told him as they lay under a dripping hedge, hiding both from the rain and from the hunting Death Eaters.

_You've isolated yourself, Harry. You always hold back your anger and respond with amusement, or with these plans that keep us safe when someone is trying to kill us. I don't know how, but you've lost yourself, and I don't know how you'll get it back._

In the end, he'd killed Voldemort without getting it back, and then he'd come to live with the Ashborn and thought that was a _good _thing. He had to hold something in reserve from Snape and Malfoy and the Ashborn because otherwise he might forget they were his enemies, and _they _never would.

But Malfoy was different from everyone else in the fortress, except maybe the centaurs, which meant that Harry might be able to be different with him, too. He exhaled hard and lifted his eyes. Malfoy blinked and stared back, then touched his wand with one slow hand.

"All right," Harry said. "You're a little _wanker _most of the time, and you frustrate me, because you never grew up and yet you still think you're the center of the universe. I reckon you're snapping because I made you think about other things, and you don't like that. But I feel sorry for you, and you exasperate me, and most of the time I can take you or leave you because you don't really want to listen to anything I say, you just want me to agree with you." He paused. "That clear enough?"

Malfoy opened his mouth far enough that Harry could see his tongue and most of his teeth, then closed it again. The bob he gave of his head looked jerky and uncoordinated, but he seemed to gain control of himself again after a moment. The click of his swallow was still audible from a long distance, Harry thought, but he was doing better than Harry had thought he would have with that mass of words.

He glanced at Kleianthe. She was still watching them with what looked like contentment, although her tail swished fast enough that he added an edge to that emotion that it wouldn't have in a human. And wonder of wonders, Thera, who usually kept a distance, had stepped closer, although the muscles of her long legs were bunched and her tail flicked like a cat's.

"I-didn't know that you thought about me that way," Malfoy said. "Because you never _said_."

"That would have damaged things back when I still thought you would listen to me," Harry said. "Now I don't care as much, because I know that you want to get along with me for the sake of the alliance." He paused, but Malfoy only kept staring at Harry as if he'd never seen him before. Harry rolled his eyes. "Truce?"

"You're harsher than you know," Malfoy said, crossing his arms. "You're still the stuck-up little noble pissant that I knew in school, but you _think _you're not, and that makes you more dangerous."

"Are we going to stand here trading insults all day?" Harry thought the centaurs would grow bored listening to that even before he would. "Or are we going to think about ways you could _earn _my respect?"

Malfoy chewed his tongue for a second, probably because whatever he had wanted to say immediately would have been stupid, and he knew it. At last he said, grudgingly, "What do you want me to do?"

"What do you like to do?" Harry asked. "What are the things in your life that don't revolve around the Ashborn and Snape?"

"Your grand plan is to have me talk about myself?" Malfoy put his head on one side and surveyed Harry up and down. "Funny, you don't _look _as if you'd been into one of Severus's potions that gives you cramps and headache if you don't do what the person who gave it to you wants."

Harry smiled tightly. As a matter of fact, he had felt off that morning when he first woke up, as though his eyes had acquired the slight mistiness they used to have before he got glasses. And his head had hurt, and his gut had cramped. But those symptoms were gone now. Harry thought the fresh air was helping. "I want to know because I can only respect people who actually seem like independent beings, and not servants or slaves. Otherwise, yeah, it'll only be pity."

"All of us are servants of Severus, whether you know it or not," Malfoy said. "He built this organization, this fortress, the structure of the Ashborn as well as the bonds of Legilimency that keep their minds roped-"

"But what is he _doing _with it?" Harry demanded. "It seems like a mobile shield, and not much else. What would you be doing if you had it?"

Malfoy blinked. "I would use it to build a pure-blood culture and alliances," he mumbled, but Harry's words had knocked the wind out of him for some reason, and what he said sounded less than definite.

"That's your latest obsession, yes," Harry said. "And you probably do want to get married and have children at some point." He leaned forwards intently. This was the first time that he felt like he was getting somewhere with Malfoy. "What do you like to do beyond that? What were you going to be, when you still thought that life would proceed normally? What did you dream of when you were in the midst of the war and didn't know if it would end?"

* * *

_Those were toys, _Draco wanted to say. _Those dreams, those aspirations for a silly boy whose parents were still alive and who had never tortured anyone. Put away because I grew up._

But he could hear what Potter would say in response to that even before he said it. That the kind of growing up Draco had done was more like growing sideways, creeping under Severus's protection and stunting himself with it, like a forest tree that tried to stand tall in the shadow of a giant.

The truth was, Draco could name who he was most easily in relation to others. Severus's lover. Severus's lieutenant. Part of the Ashborn. Potter's rival. His parents' son. The last Malfoy.

Nothing that said anything about who he was beyond that, who he was on his own, if you stripped him down to bare essences. Once he had thought he would find out what he was like, pared down, in the Dark Lord's dungeons, but Severus had been with him then. That was the first time Draco had felt like a shadow in the wake of an intense sun. Severus, trapped by an enemy and plotting to escape, was all burning light.

But when they had broken free of the enemy and escaped, Severus became...

Yes. More of a shadow. More of the chill darkness that Draco had thought he would leave behind forever when he broke away with him from the Dark Lord's rule. Those first days, of capturing Death Eaters and changing their Marks and their minds so that they became Ashborn, had been exciting.

But since then, excitement was rare on the ground.

Draco shivered and reached for the one honest answer he thought he could make, at least if Potter was the one asking. "I don't know what I want yet," he said. "Other than power, and safety, and freedom, and a family." He wouldn't speak the word _love _in front of someone like Potter. "But I will."

And Potter smiled at him as if he had filled the garden with sunlight instead of a bland answer, and nodded. "Fine, then. We'll eventually get along." He turned back to Kleianthe. "Is that the kind of thing you were thinking of when you told us to speak?"

Draco glanced at the centaur. He had fallen so deeply into his own head that he had almost forgotten she was there, but she was, and she glanced at him with the same deep, calm eyes as before. Her hand toyed with the iron chain that decorated her wrist.

"Essentially," she said. "I think that we should discuss more definite plans for the alliance. If you plan to include the merfolk, then we will want to be present when you communicate with them."

Draco relaxed, licking his lips. He had survived the first challenge, and in such a way that Potter was less than the ultimate git about it that Draco had thought he would be. That was-odd, but welcome.

And as he started recovering from the spell that Severus's shadow had cast over him, then perhaps he could learn more about what he wanted.

* * *

Severus watched the snake automaton going about its duties. Its jewel eyes shone, its tongue flickered constantly as it slithered around the inside of the storage room that it had come to inspect, and its segments flashed whenever it turned a coil and caught the light from the torches anew.

He wished he could be as metallic, as cool, as distant from the frustration that once again roared within him.

He had opened a potion near Potter's room that drifted in and covered the walls with fumes that would eventually reach out to him and make him sick, irritable, and unable to sleep. It had seemed the best way to begin, as Potter had resisted Severus's interference in his food without complaint so far. He might do the same thing if he began to sicken from it.

But Potter had arisen in the morning just as usual, not acted tired, and not used glamours on his face to conceal marks of sleeplessness, at least not that Bellatrix could detect. Severus wanted to eat his tongue. What would it take to reach the stupid boy, to make him understand who he was dealing with?

_Dumbledore's remnants, the Dark Lord's dross? _

Severus went still. He knew that was not a leftover voice from one of his enemies whispering in his head. He had scrubbed his mind thoroughly of any trace of the Dark Lord's presence, and Albus, skilled as he was at Legilimency, had never been able to penetrate the shields that Severus had raised for the Dark Lord.

But he had not had such thoughts as that before. He could only assume they were inspired by Draco's defection and Potter's stubbornness.

He watched the snake automaton again as it left the room, forcing himself to contemplate nothing but the metal until his fury ebbed and he could think rationally once more.

He did not have to despise himself, not now. He had risen far for a man who had been a mere tool caught between two masters. He had done so little with his talents as either spy or Potions master when he was young, but now he had shown how he could make a life out of the first and a living out of the second.

_But who is there to be impressed? Albus and the Dark Lord are dead. Draco is alienated from you. The Ashborn think only what you tell them to think. Potter has not bowed his head to your bit and bridle yet._

He could have answered that he had the respect of his colleagues, other Potions masters who knew what he could do and admired his experimental results, but even that was not true. He did not dare publish under his true name, which meant his alter ego was still a newcomer in the field. He might have some interest at the moment, but it would take years until they thought him someone who made Potions a career and a love, not simply a young experimenter caught up in the first flush of enthusiasm.

It was...

There was nothing to his life if he thought about it like that. Nothing he had fought for in the last three years had come to pass, unless he counted a minimum sense of safety, and Potter disrupted even that.

Severus closed his eyes. He knew he stood on the edge of an abyss. He knew there was a path around it, running silent in the darkness.

He did not know how to take that path yet.

But he was wise enough to realize that he should concentrate his energy at the moment on finding it, instead of tormenting Potter.

_Another way that he balks me. _

Several crates of ingredients he did not recognize vanished into billowing black-green flames. Severus watched them until they had burned out and taken his rage with them, and then went back to his rooms to read and to think.

* * *

Sharing space with Malfoy turned out not to be as much of a problem as Harry had first thought.

They talked about the centaurs and with the centaurs, mostly. By the end of the week, they'd hammered out a solid plan to reach out to their next few allies, or at least the beings who had been part of the ancient pure-blood alliances: the merfolk, the small groups of werewolves and vampires who dwelt in the Forbidden Forest and mostly avoided contact with humans, the unicorns, and the "drakes." Harry thought they were related to dragons, but Kleianthe and Thera didn't seem to understand the difference, only that there was one, so Harry let the subject die until they met one.

Malfoy was tolerable when he wasn't talking about Snape and how he worshipped him. Even funny, although Harry was sort of reluctant to admit that. He could joke about things that weren't insults to Harry's friends; he could laugh when Cadmaea finally got up the courage to approach him and then he leaped a foot in the air in turn; he was the one who pointed out a smear of chocolate on Harry's cheek that the centaurs were too polite to mention.

Life settled into a regulated pace. Harry didn't feel sick or irritated after that first day, and Snape avoided him. Malfoy sometimes found him in the library to ask neutral questions, but didn't try to restrict his reading anymore. Harry read novels, and fairy tales, and history, and books about Quidditch, and he wrote letters that the snake carried back and forth.

Ron and Hermione's letters were still hard to read, though. Harry told himself he _wanted _them to move on; their lives wouldn't be complete until they did, which meant that his would also be incomplete. But they talked about so many people he would never see again and so many things he would never do.

He restricted himself sharply when he caught those thoughts, though, and he would do exercises in his rooms or go find another book to read. _You shouldn't have chosen this if you were only going to whinge about it._

All in all, he thought he could survive and endure, and he went on thinking that until the day that Snape appeared in the library and asked to talk to him.

* * *

Severus had watched Potter for some time before he had approached him. That was enough to let the starbursts of hate flare and die in his mind as he thought of various words, and then managed to look at Potter and see what was there instead of what he had _thought _was there.

_Boy. _But he was no longer a boy. He had grown into a man. The boy Severus had remembered, the one who had cornered him the night after he killed the only man who believed in him and screamed insults at him, could not have killed the Dark Lord.

_James's son. _But he did not speak to Severus in the same way, or about the same things. He was separated from his friends, which meant separated from fellow bullies, and there were no young Slytherins here he could intimidate in any case. And his heritage came just as much from his mother's side of the family, although Severus often found that even more painful to think about.

_Dumbledore's chosen object._

That one was harder to get over. If Albus had placed more trust in Severus, so much of what Potter had had to do could have been avoided. Severus would have learned more, and done more, and been acknowledged as a hero by the wizarding world. Potter would have known more but done less, and might have been kept very firmly in place by Severus's growing power.

But then, all those choices rested with Albus, not with Potter. The boy could not act on facts he did not have.

Come to that, Severus was still not sure how he much he _did _know. That the boy had not accused him of Albus's murder in the same way suggested some growth or discovery in the three years since that night on the Tower. But he had not defeated the Dark Lord in the way that Albus had thought he would have to, by dying. So he might not have known that such a sacrifice was required.

_Could the Dark Lord still be alive, clinging to the Horcrux in Potter?_

But Severus, though the chill of the thought was like the chill of space between the stars, did not entertain that suspicion for long. He had felt the evidence of his Mark, which had changed and dimmed and begun to shrink when the Dark Lord died. That had not happened when he had confronted Potter as a toddler and been merely sent away. He was gone, and they were free.

Free to choose other paths, including, in this case, the path around the abyss.

Severus straightened himself and approached.

"Potter."

Potter had had his head bowed over a book, his frown sharp as he tried to work out a meaning obviously beyond his abilities. (Severus had seen nothing in this grown version to counteract his assumption that Potter was, generally, unintelligent). Severus had seen his chair pushed close to the table. He had apparently ignored the signs such as the opening door and the approaching footsteps that someone else inhabited the library.

But now he was on his feet, not tangled up trying to escape from his seat, and the chair was on the other side of the room, the book shut and under one arm, his wand hand turned towards Severus. He opened his mouth in a silent snarl and shook his head when he realized who was standing in front of him, then dropped his hand.

"What is it?" he asked shortly.

Severus spent a few moments studying him, not answering. The boy was incredibly quick when he must be, but not quick enough, except in a Quidditch dive, to fool Severus's eyes. Severus had never seen him move like that, which meant his reflexes were another legacy of the war.

Positioned towards the exit, holding the book in case someone had come to destroy it, but ready to move. Severus had the impression that if he _had _been there to attack Potter, Potter would have tossed the book into the air or to the side and been able to use any part of his body that he had to in the escape or the fight.

"I wanted to speak with you," Severus said, and kept his voice softer than he would have otherwise. Potter still glared at him. Well, perhaps he remembered the times that Severus had hissed insults at him in a low tone. Severus did not alter his voice, though, for the sake of not making Potter more suspicious. "About doing other things for me such as awakening the snake."

"That automaton is awake now," Potter said. "What else can you possibly want from me?"

Severus paused. "I assumed that you would like your friends to visit again," he said. "That you would enjoy longer trips away from the fortress, supervised by the Ashborn. Even hostages in active wars are allowed more freedom than you often have been."

"How wonderful of you to notice," Potter said. "And you would offer me these benefits now-why? There's no reason that you should _need _to offer them to me, and I know you better than to think you would give me anything that's not required for me to stay alive."

Severus breathed out his irritation, breathed in calm. He despised Potter's quick judgment, his apparent inability to trust that Severus might mean his offer-

And they were the same traits that he would have expressed had their situations been reversed, he the hostage and Potter the captor.

"I wish to offer you more benefits so that you will cease to trouble the Ashborn," he said. "To humiliate me, and to seek ways to change things beyond my back."

He expected many responses from that. Surprise, outrage, feigned surprise, feigned outrage. He didn't expect the way that Potter's arm wrapping the book and his lips both relaxed, his eyes narrowing as though he wanted to hide the light that appeared in the back of them.

"It bothers you that Draco is changing, doesn't it?" Potter whispered. "That he's gaining some sense of independence and the right to live a life that doesn't involve hanging on your every word. It _troubles _you that he might actually emerge from this as someone who's a whole person. That's the kind of _trouble _that you'd like to stop me causing." Potter lifted his head, and Severus knew that he had seen unicorns who looked less proud. "Nothing you could offer me would be enough."

Severus grimaced and shook his head. "Potter, are you mad? I have long since ceased to think that Draco must be an adjunct to me-"

"But you're upset when he isn't." Potter leaned nearer, increasing the distance between him and the door. Severus knew he could not count on that as a sign of increased trust, however. "You wanted him as this enchanted young lover who could make you feel younger, desired. That doesn't include him having a life of his own, though it might include hobbies like establishing the pure-blood alliances. But you don't respect those hobbies, or you wouldn't have ensured that there was only enough food on my trays when the centaurs first arrived to feed either them _or _me, but not both."

"Respect for Draco has little to do with respect for you," Severus said, and pounded each word home like an iron nail. The conversation was turning from the track that he had intended it to take. "I did not-"

"He was the one who invited the centaurs," Potter said. Another step closer, and Severus saw a dark shimmer flare up around Potter's shoulders and neck. Or did he imagine that he saw it? He had sometimes imagined such things during the hardest days of his confinement by the Dark Lord. "He's the one who's been talking about building this culture and this alliance with other beings. And you wanted to starve the centaurs? That's disrespect for him, yes. You're saying that he can play with his little hobbies as long as they don't inconvenience you, but the moment they do, he'd better pack them away and listen, the adults are talking."

Severus watched the dark shimmer and said nothing for a moment. Yes, the shimmer was there, but it faded as Severus watched.

He had seen it before, or imagined that he saw it before, around the heads of those about to die. Or, he realized later when it often faded as those Death Eaters left the Dark Lord's presence, those who felt they were about to die. Death averted, they came closer to life, and so lost the feeling. Severus did not know for certain what had caused his ability to see those auras, if it was real, but suspected one of the experimental potions the Lord had had ingest during some of those darker days.

Why would Potter feel-

He thought Severus might kill him. And still the suicidal brightness shone in his eyes. Still he faced Severus without a trace of fear that Severus, experienced both in detecting teenage wrongdoings and in the gathering anger or terror in an adult that might make them lash out, could have sniffed out.

So Severus had his answer to one question: why Potter had endured the starvation for two days instead of complaining or asking for more food or dividing his share with the centaurs. He did not fear dying from lack of food. He did not see it _worth his while _to complain to Severus.

But he asked the question, because he wanted to see Potter's response. "Why did you not ask me to stop the starvation, if it troubled you so much?"

"Because you were more likely to refuse if I asked," Potter said. "Given your disrespect for the centaurs and Draco in general, why should I imagine that it would be different? So I gave the food to the centaurs and found other means to feed myself."

"Not well," Severus said, looking at the prominent bones in Potter's face.

Potter opened his mouth. Severus thought he was about to say something, but he began to give a wheezy laugh instead, leaning against the table and shaking his head. Severus waited some time for the frenzy to subside, and it did not.

"Why do you laugh?" he asked finally. "If you wish to make fun of me, there are other ways you could do so." He had not realized how much he still hated to be laughed at, no one had done it for so long—except the Dark Lord, and he had other forces backing the laughter that made it impossible to feel the same way. It made his skin feel hot and tight, and too small for the back of his neck.

"Because you're blaming me for not feeding myself well when _you _were the one who was starving me," Potter choked, wiping tears away from his eyes with the back of his hand. "If I had managed to get full meals, then you would have accused me of stealing. There's no way to win, and you wonder why I'm laughing?"

Severus sat stiffly in his chair. He had the vague feeling that anything he tried to say or do now would only make him look more ridiculous, and he did not want to.

_This was the risk you took, that you agreed to, when you decided that you should confront Potter in this way. You will not always know what to do, and you may look ridiculous. But you will not lack a sympathetic audience, if you choose to cultivate it, along with the antagonistic one._

"You will not suffer the like again," Severus said, because he wanted to say it and because he felt the need to regain control of the conversation. "Whatever I must do, you shall have regular food and shelter and water and no direct pain."

Potter gave him a faint half-smile. "Sure, Snape. Whatever you say."

"You do not believe me," Severus said, and he felt a distant kind of insult. Of course Potter would not trust him, and his self-evaluation and self-worth did not depend on the trust of a boy—

Who was not a boy. Who was the one causing him to fall into all sorts of old habits he had thought overcome, simply because Severus had hated one of his parents.

Yes, this would be harder than he thought.

Potter shook his head. His smile had vanished, and he had a familiar expression on his face. Severus realized after a moment of staring that he had seen it in the mirror, on a day when the students in his Potions classes had been more troublesome than usual. "You don't understand, still. You can make certain promises and certain Vows, and I'll accept them. I would never have agreed to be a hostage if I thought that you had a way to break the Unbreakable Vows and live."

"Then tell me." Severus realized that he was on his feet, leaning forwards over the table. He had made as many accommodations as he could when dealing with Potter, and he did not know why the boy was now intent on disregarding those sacrifices.

_Because he does not see them and understand them in the same way that, say, Draco would. Draco would grasp at once and in what ways this was different from your usual behavior, and be awed. But Potter does not have the same experience of you. He sees you only as a tormentor._

Potter gave him his answer even as Severus arrived at it differently. "You can make certain promises, but you'll always find some way around them that will let you hurt me. That's all."

Severus sat back down and thought. He wondered how worth it making sacrifices for Potter's better regard was. After all, he could concentrate on repairing his relationship with Draco and even with the centaurs, and take a base of power in that way that was not available to Potter. Draco might vacillate at the moment, might think that he would rather have Potter's increased regard than the same from Severus, but he would come back if Severus showed him a bit of the indulgence that, he had to admit, was missing from the way he had treated Draco in the past few months.

He would not make another Unbreakable Vow. He had already bound himself by that method as much as he cared to. No one, not even Draco, would ever know of the sweating he had done before he agreed to the ones he gave Potter, the silent memories he had to battle of the Vows that both Narcissa and Albus had extracted from him.

But a bargain, of the successful kind that he and Potter had made to allow awakening for the automaton along with a visit from the brat's—the man's—friends…

"You want better treatment, I would assume?" he said abruptly.

Potter's eyes narrowed, and the look he gave Severus was of a wild creature that had been mistreated too many times. "I can live without it," he said. "That was part of the point I was making."

"You do not want to rely on me for it, was how what you spoke came across to me," Severus said coolly, feeling better now. Potter did not have that control that kept him above his own swarming emotions. "I can understand that, but if we bargain for better treatment, something you want in return for something I want that is ongoing, we would be close to equals."

Again Potter laughed, though at least this time the sound was shorter and sharper than before. "You think that I _need _that? That I can't survive without it? That I want to be dependent on you?"

"It is not dependence if it is a bargain of equals," Severus said, though he thought he could see why Potter would understand it that way. "If you do something for me, then you may be able to trust me more than you have up to this point."

"You're ridiculous," Potter said. "I already helped you with the snake automaton. What else can I possibly do that you would value enough to give me anything like freedom from starvation?"

Severus blinked and shook his head. "You undervalue your skills."

"I'm a Parselmouth," Potter said. "I have no other skills that you would value."

"Your understanding of the wars that we might someday find ourselves fighting—"

Again the black aura shone around his head, and this time Severus saw the fury spark to life in his eyes and blacken them as well. "If you think that I would _ever _betray my friends," Potter said, his voice descending into a register that made Severus think of werewolves, "then you should try to kill me now, so that I can break the Vow and send your soul on to a more productive afterlife."

Severus lifted his hand. He had no illusions that it would hold the boy back if he was determined to strike, but that was part of the point. They were going to try and arrange things so that he _wouldn't _be determined to strike. "There are skills that I can use you for that don't involve being a spy."

"I won't negotiate with Malfoy and try to shove him back under your twisted dominion, either."

"What a strange opinion you _do _have of me," Severus murmured. That thought would not have occurred to him, because he did not believe Potter the sort of man who could persuade Draco to do as he asked. "I would not ask that of you, either. What I want, Potter, is someone who can _teach _me Parseltongue. It is an inborn gift, yes, but also a magical language. And as such, it can be learned."

He had not known he would ask for such a thing until he spoke, but the more he thought of it, the more sense it made. Of course he would not ask for Potter to join in the defense of the Ashborn, not when he despised them. But he did not think that Potter would object to teaching him something. He would get to enjoy the position of superior knowledge for once.

It would give Severus time as well as a useful skill. Time to figure out what to do with Potter, to learn if he could be collared and subdued after all—and how he would rid himself of Potter without breaking the Vows should that prove not to be the case.

Potter hovered in place, frowning at him as if he couldn't believe that Severus would really want something so pedestrian. Severus spread his arms, inviting a closer inspection. "If you do not want to teach me," he said, "then suggest something, and we will adopt it."

It was good to see the way Potter tensed and then relaxed as if he would lunge for the library door. Good to see the spark of uncertainty in his eyes. _He is not the only one who can teach others that emotion, after all._

* * *

_What is he playing at? _

Harry couldn't imagine a situation under which Snape would _willingly _seek him out and ask for his knowledge. And he couldn't imagine that Snape would have that much use for Parseltongue. How many snake automatons was he going to build and activate on a daily basis?

Then Harry paused.

_He might not have much use for the Parseltongue, but this reminds me of Galen._

Galen—the only name he ever gave—had been a desperate wizard they met in the course of the Horcrux Hunt. Hermione had thought he was a relative of a Death Eater who saw no other way to free his family from Voldemort's hold. Harry hadn't ever really trusted him, but in the end he had died finding the Cup, and that was a testimony of his loyalty in its own way.

Galen had acted strangely around them, snapping out pure-blood prejudices and then deliberately spending time with Hermione. Harry understood it after he thought about it a bit more. Galen knew that he needed them and was trying to fight his own disgust, the thing that could destroy them, by pretending that he was gaining something substantial from discussions with Hermione. It was a way of keeping himself in check far more than it was a way to ally with Harry and his friends or learn to trust them. But that would happen at the same time.

Harry thought Snape was doing the same thing.

Harry half-grimaced. He wasn't at all sure that he wanted to end up with the same kind of half-built and tottering loyalty to Snape that he had had where Galen was concerned. That had been a short-term situation, not a lifelong one, the way the hostage-holding would be. And Snape had a history of personal antagonism to him that Harry hadn't had with Galen.

But…

If this was a way past the nonsense of starvation and potions in his food, or whatever Harry's sickness the other day resulted from, then he thought it was a good one.

And perhaps he could continue to stand between Snape and Malfoy, or Snape and the centaurs, this way. He could distract Snape's attention with ease, at least. Snape had never seemed interested in tormenting someone else when he had Harry as a target.

"Fine," he said, and stretched out his hand. "I teach you Parseltongue, and you treat me better and let me visit with my friends sometimes."

Snape opened his mouth as if to disagree, but then nodded and clasped his hand in return. He let it go quickly, and stood up to stride out of the library.

Harry watched him go. _Get on his good side far enough and quickly enough, and maybe I could convince him to free the Ashborn._

Then Harry snorted. _That, _at least, was an impossible dream, one he would not fall in love with. The war had taught him a romance with reality.

_Focus on that first._


	10. Teaching Moments

Thank you again for all the reviews!

_Chapter Ten—Teaching Moments_

"Good luck."

Draco blinked in mild shock. When he had told Potter that he would be dreaming of the werewolves that night, in the hopes that they would agree to become part of the same alliance as the centaurs, he hadn't thought that Potter would give him that much approval. If anything, given his tension in the last few days, he'd been certain Potter would insist on joining the dreams, the way that he'd been the first to contact Sidereal.

But Potter didn't seem to realize that this was anything remarkable. He opened the door of his painted rooms and stepped inside as though something pursued him.

"Wait!" Draco blurted. He grimaced as he moved past Bellatrix. Sound too eager, and Potter would have reasons to scorn him.

Once again, Potter didn't seem to realize what sort of reaction he _should _have. He did nothing but turn around and stare. "What?" he asked. "I thought we'd discussed all the questions you would have."

Draco leaned forwards. "Since when did you trust me enough to make contact with a new magical creature species all by myself?"

"Since we spent hours talking about it, and you have the centaurs to disappoint, as well as me, if you do anything stupid," Potter said. He looked as if he had a mild concussion with the way he was blinking. "You want this dream to come true for different reasons than I do, but it would still be stupid for you to sabotage yourself."

Draco reached out. He could feel the muscles in Potter's arm moving beneath his hand, and the way that Potter went still at the touch. His eyes had probably already found out two escape routes and three ways to kill him, Draco knew. If Potter had any legacy from the war, it was a combination of better reflexes and paranoia.

"You have to know," Draco said. He knew that he wanted to convey this, but he didn't know the right words—the way he hadn't when he wanted to threaten Potter, the way he hadn't when he wanted to ask for Potter's respect, the way he hadn't when he wanted to explain the reality of his relationship with Severus. Potter had that effect on him. "You have to—you have to distrust me somewhat, because of the way that we acted in Hogwarts."

Potter's face cleared. "Of course I do. But that just means that I don't trust you to do things for disinterested reasons, the way I would with my friends. I trust that you'll act in your own self-interest. And I don't think doing something stupid just because you want to spite me fits that."

Draco shook his head. His tongue was clumsy, his head was filled with fog, but he _knew_ this was important. "You also think I can be better than that. You've told me so, when you talked to me in the past."

Potter gazed at him expressionlessly for a moment. Draco knew what he hoped the git was thinking—that Draco had unexpected depths—but he had no way of knowing. Another thing the war had done was make Potter harder to read most of the time, though by no means always.

"You could be better, yes," Potter said. "But you'll need to be the one to make that decision. I was wrong to think I could stand between you and what you feared. At best, I can only protect you for a little while, and you'll have to go on after that and see what you can do."

He shut the door between them. Bellatrix took up a guard position outside it. Draco glared at her and at the uncommunicative wood for a while before he snorted and turned away.

Of course, he would do what they had agreed on with the centaurs as part of the alliance and dream of the werewolves that night. But he wished for something more—

And did not know what it was, as usual.

_I will learn, _he promised himself, turning away so that he could walk down the corridor to his own rooms, and his own bed. _And when I do, I'll astonish Potter, and I'll _demand _his respect. He'll have no choice but to give it to me._

* * *

How did you prepare for teaching a class in a magical language that sounded like English to you?

Harry had thought of several ways to do it, and had to discard all of them, because they relied on him knowing what proper pronunciation in Parseltongue sounded like. In the end, he gathered up a few books with plenty of pictures when Bellatrix motioned to him and followed her to the library. He would just have to use a method that relied on Snape.

Snape was waiting for him at the great central table in the library, the one where Harry preferred reading books in the last several days because no one could sneak up on him there, the way Snape had. He had his hands folded in front of him and a severe frown on his face of the kind that used to frighten Harry out of his wits.

Harry shrugged now and dropped the books in front of Snape. When you'd survived a dragon charging you and shrieking steam into your face while you tried frantically to back out of its burrow, a frown was less intimidating.

But never harmless. Harry planned to keep his eyes on Snape's hands and his ears on the tone in his voice all through the lesson.

"I can't hear Parseltongue," he told Snape. "It sounds like English to me. So what I'll do is look at pictures of common objects, the ones you want to learn, and speak the Parseltongue word for them. You'll have to listen and then repeat the word."

Snape's lip curled in disdain. "And how will you know that I'm speaking Parseltongue or English, then?"

Harry nodded. "I thought of that. I _hope _that when you speak the word back to me, it'll sound like distorted English to my ears. The wrong pronunciation, or something. You can usually tell when someone has an accent, even if they know the words well. I hope that happens with you."

Snape sat there watching him for a moment, as though he expected something more. Harry looked steadily back. He didn't know what else Snape wanted, and he would have felt silly trying to guess.

"You do not know if this will work at all," breathed Snape, like someone having a revelation. "You do not know—"

"No, I bloody well don't," Harry snapped. "But what _matters _is that you'll learn the language, if this works. I don't want to hear anything from you on the subject unless you actually have a better idea, and from the way you're staring at me, you don't."

Snape's hands clenched on the table, but he didn't draw his wand or make threatening noises about potions, the way that Harry had been more than half-expecting. After an examination of Harry that seemed to count the hairs in Harry's nose, he gave his head a rough nod.

"Good," Harry told him sweetly, and opened the first book.

Since Snape hadn't expressed any preference, Harry thought they might as well start with pictures of food, which snakes thought about a lot. There was a mouse on the first page, a bright-eyed photograph that sniffed at the camera and moved around its burrow. Harry looked at it, thought of the little snake—whose presence he wouldn't reveal to Snape unless he had to—and then spoke the word for mouse.

Snape stilled across from him. Harry smiled and didn't look up, because that would encourage the idiot to think that his motions were important to Harry. He spoke it again, thinking about the way that a snake would unhinge its jaws to eat the mouse, thinking about the size of the tunnels that they would need to slide down, thinking about the muffled squeaks that the mouse would give. All of those would have to make his word more real, because Harry still heard the word "mouse" no matter how he said it.

Snape stirred again. Harry looked up and blinked away the image of the snake and the mouse in front of his eyes. Thinking too much more of them would only result in him speaking Parseltongue to Snape, and he doubted Snape would accept that. "How was that?" he asked. "Could you hear it?"

"Yes, I could," Snape said, after a moment of strained silence in which Harry wondered if he'd somehow stopped being a Parselmouth. "But you hurried through it. The words rattled and rustled too much for me to keep track."

"Not words," Harry said. "Word. That was only one word, the word for 'mouse.'"

"Then repeat it again."

Harry looked back at the picture and did. He saw Snape leaning forwards with his lips silently moving, and held back laughter. That would ruin the calm picture he was trying to project and the truce for sure. So he chanted the word for mouse, over and over, and saw Snape's eyes darken with frustration.

_Well, he said it could be learned, not that he could learn it in a day. It probably frustrates him to think that _anyone _around here knows something he doesn't, though._

Harry paused as a new thought occurred to him. Perhaps that was one reason Snape had bound the Ashborn so thoroughly with Legilimency, instead of just using the Mark and reserving the mental control for people like Bellatrix who couldn't be trusted otherwise. He wanted to be sure that their eyes and ears brought them no information he did not know, that he could trust them to report on everything they saw and did.

_That still doesn't excuse breaking their free will with his bloody mind control, though._

"Mus," Snape said, or something that sounded like it. The word was deformed, and a blur seemed to pass across Harry's ears as he said it, like the way a heat shimmer would pass across his eyes. Harry blinked, and wished he could twitch his ears.

"Not quite," Harry said, and Snape hissed in pure frustration. Harry grinned. He must have spoken in Parseltongue without realizing it. "Not quite," he said, tearing his concentration away from both the book and Snape, who reminded him too much of a serpent. "It sounded like you were missing half the vowels."

"From what I can hear, this tongue does not _have _vowels," Snape said darkly, but repeated the word again. This time, Harry thought it was missing the first sound, and told him so. Snape said it a third time, all but biting the end off.

Harry smiled. "A little more, and I think you'll have it," he said. "Listen." He turned back to the mouse, said its name, and listened for Snape's response.

"…us…"

"That was worse than before," Harry pointed out.

"You are not speaking as clearly." Snape filled every word with patience as if it was poison. "How do you expect me to learn this from you if mumble like a first-year student caught pissing in a cauldron?"

Harry paused. "That didn't happen, did it?"

"A few times, yes, when I kept spoiled brats too long in detention for their bladders."

Harry shook his head, chewing on his tongue for a second so he could keep the words about what he thought of Snape's detentions firmly in his mouth—and found the solution. He grimaced. "We're both frustrated," he said. "You because you don't get it right the first time, and me because I'm teaching _you_. Let's take ten minutes to think about something else, or you can practice if you want, and then we'll start again."

Snape stared at him with fathomless eyes. Harry thought he wouldn't agree, just before he stood up and turned to walk around the nearest stack of books. Harry sighed and slumped into his chair, stretching. He felt more tired than he expected, and when he cast a _Tempus _Charm, he was surprised to see how much time had passed.

_Well. At least it'll get these weary hours of my life to go past a bit faster._

* * *

_That the boy would think to send _me _away, as if he were the professor and I the misbehaving student…_

Severus closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose hard enough that his eyes would have watered had he kept them open. It was somewhat of a revelation, how hard it was to slow his own breathing and admit that what Potter had done was…

Was right. He had done the same thing himself when some of his students grew frustrated by their own mistakes in his NEWTS Potions class and he knew they would only waste time and valuable ingredients if they tried again.

_I did not expect such wisdom from him._

But then, he had not expected much of anything from Potter, and he was continually discovering things that changed the stakes. He was tired of them. He should use this brief holiday from the intricacies of Parseltongue—and its use of more sibilants than any language should wield—to examine what he had learned about Potter in the past day and decide how much of it was likely to be useful.

He had learned that the boy was most likely a formidable fighter in some circumstances. But that was complemented by a skittish set of reflexes and a suicidal urge that meant he was perhaps only a third more likely to do the right thing in a complex situation. Severus was not at all sure that he would trust the boy should he find himself trapped in battle or in a corner with him.

He had the capacity to change his mind about people like Draco and Severus, or he would never have agreed to help them or live with them.

_On the other hand, how much of that is truly changing his mind and how much is agreeing because we do not matter to him except as potential threats to his friends? _

That connected back with the suicidal urges Potter seemed to have. He could be effective, even perhaps magnificent, in battle, but sooner or later his lack of defenses and his lack of concern for his own life would catch up with him and he would have to surrender or collapse or die.

Then Severus paused. He still thought as though he would fight a war in the next year, because that was the situation he had come to adult growth in—a war against the Marauders, against all who thought he was worth less because of his Muggle blood and because he practiced the Dark Arts and because of his House—and continued on with in maturity, during the wars with his conscience and the Dark Lord and his own hatreds.

But now he had the Ashborn. Now he had the freedom that he had fought for.

When had it ceased to be enough?

* * *

"Mouse."

Harry grinned. He hadn't realized how good it would feel to finally hear Snape say the word in good Parseltongue, which Harry reckoned was good English to his ears. "Good! That's it. Do you want to do another word today, or not?"

"No." Snape stood, staring down at him. Harry remained seated on purpose, looking up calmly. Snape might think he was intimidating, but he had nothing on Voldemort chanting over Harry's strapped-down and helpless body, thinking that he'd finally found the right way to avert the prophecy and have Harry die without killing himself.

_You promised that you wouldn't think about that anymore._

Harry twitched a shoulder in response to his conscience. It was _his _responsibility what he thought about here, in a place where no one would hear his nightmares or care if they did.

"You have not yet asked me about a time when your friends might visit again," Snape said.

Harry shrugged. "I reckoned that would have to wait until you saw that learning Parseltongue was actually going to work. Kind of a useless bargain if you can't learn what I'm supposed to be trading to you for good treatment and seeing my friends."

Snape closed his eyes. He'd had that habit when confronted by Neville's cauldrons, Harry thought.

_Neville. _He hadn't seen Neville in months. Harry tried to conceal a swallow as well as the harshness in his throat, and kept watching Snape, curious as to what he would do, or try, next.

"You can invite them to visit on the morrow," Snape said. "The same conditions as before, and the time they can visit is two days from now."

Harry stared at him. Snape's eyes gave no clue what he was thinking, and he wasn't clutching at his wand anymore—hadn't been since Harry had told him his pronunciation of the Parseltongue word was halfway right, in fact—so Harry couldn't tell from that, either. If this was a trap, it was a subtle one.

Then he thought he saw it. "As long as you make the same promise as before," he said. "Not to harm them, or take them hostage, or allow any of the other Ashborn to take them hostage or harm them, either."

"They shall come and be here and leave safely," Snape said. "I swear it."

Harry hesitated, caught. _Well, shit. Now what? _"Thanks," he said at last, because he did want to see Ron and Hermione again, and if Snape was inspired by some sort of mystical Spirit of Giving or memory of Dumbledore or something else, then Harry didn't want to waste the chance.

Snape inclined his head back to him and swept out of the room. Harry watched him go, baffled. Snape's bargains with him in the past few days didn't make much sense—

Not unless he wanted a way to neutralize Harry from working on the Ashborn, or wanted some way to get Malfoy back under his control. Working with Harry must be preferable to having him thinking about either of those goals.

With a grim smile, Harry gathered up the books. _He'll just have to find out the hard way that I was serious about returning free will to everyone._

* * *

Draco closed his eyes and spent a moment in silent meditation. He was certain that _this _was something he did better than Potter, at least. He could organize his thoughts and marshal them in one or two directions when he wanted to, not dart off after every new idea the way that Potter would.

Draco wondered for a moment, idly, what Potter's Animagus form would be. Something canine, he was sure. A terrier, perhaps, with a tendency to bark frantically at things that weren't there and chase every rabbit that crossed its path. Draco could feel Potter's fur beneath his hands, softer than that ridiculous hair—

_You accuse him of babbling and lack of focus, and then you do the same thing? _

Draco bit his lip and bent down to his task, building on that image of Potter-as-dog to begin imagining the werewolves. He knew that they would dwell in the furthest parts of the Forbidden Forest, as far as possible from human contact. The darkest parts, too; he had read once that most werewolves shunned light that would reveal their differences from normal humans, like their amber eyes and the way their teeth and nails might grow longer. Or it could remind them of the moon and the curse they suffered when it was full.

He had to think like a werewolf. He had to see the spot where they dwelt, in his mind if not elsewhere. He had to make contact with them.

Around him, scents suddenly sprang to life. Sun-warmed grass. Moldering leaves. Some strong and spicy smell that Draco thought probably came from a particular species of tree. Soft earth. A rotting carcass. The last wasn't pleasant, but Draco worked to cough and clear it out of his throat, and, when he thought he was ready for what he might see, opened his eyes.

In front of him was a deep dip in the earth, with steps scraped into the sides and what looked like a chair made of stone at the end Draco was facing. Overhead was a dark sky full of stars, although he knew that the sun was still up outside. Draco started, then forced himself to relax. This was a dream, after all, and the features of both landscape and time inside it would be the ones that the person he communicated with dreamed into being.

_Person._

_ Werewolf? _

Draco shrugged irritably. He thought Potter would probably say that it was an excellent sign he was already thinking of the werewolves as people. Then again, Potter was mad. Draco turned in a slow circle, hearing the ever-present crackle of leaves under his boots the same way he had when he visited the white centaur, and scanned for the sign of any inhabitants. His mind had pointed him here, but there didn't seem to be any werewolves about.

"Hullo?" he called out at last, feeling extremely stupid. But he would feel stupider still if he stood here and waited and wondered when someone was within earshot.

The darkness stirred at the edge of the clearing, beneath the stone chair. Draco caught a pair of bright eyes, somewhere in color between gold and orange, gleaming there. He swallowed back what he wanted to say next and watched carefully.

The woman who came forth was taller than Draco had thought she would be, given how low the eyes had been. She stooped as she walked, though, and maybe she could walk on four legs as easily as two; Draco had so little knowledge of werewolves. Her hair hung around her face, long and tangled and grey, but not like the streaks that Draco had seen on Severus. It was a cat-color, frosted with white. She faced him, and opened her mouth in silence. Draco winced. Her teeth were so crooked and sharp that the only word he could really apply to them was "fangs."

"Um," he said. "Hullo."

The woman answered him, and if her voice was deep, at least she spoke a language he could understand. "Why have you come here? Most humans would not venture anywhere near this part of the dream-realm."

"I've come to invite you into an alliance," Draco said, and when her eyes widened, he worried for a moment if she would think that the invitation was personal or realize that it extended to other werewolves. _Think about that problem when you come to it. _"The old pure-blood alliances included your people, I know."

"You speak about us as though we were some backwards tribe," the woman said. "We are humans, like you." There was a depth in her voice that wasn't a snarl, Draco thought, but might be one when it grew up.

"You know that there's a difference," Draco said, and he was surprised to hear the calmness in his own voice. _I don't think Severus could stand here like this and speak this way after being threatened by a werewolf. Even Potter might have trouble with it. _"Or you wouldn't live out in the Forbidden Forest and avoid the society of other people."

The woman sprang lightly into the air and landed in front of him, staring down. Draco swallowed. She reminded him of some of what he had seen of Fenrir Greyback, but _he _had been a simple and savage killing machine, dedicated to using his bulk to smash people to the earth and cow them. She had a wild grace in her, and Draco could picture her better as someone who turned into a lean wolf on the full moon.

"We are here because the Ministry wishes to harm us," she said. "No other reason." The snarl was present now.

Draco stood tall, and nodded. "And we're here to change that. Long ago, the pure-bloods were bound to others in a relationship of interdependence and alliance. I want to bring that back."

The woman cocked her head. "Your name?"

"Draco Malfoy." Draco hesitated, then gave the other names reluctantly. _We're part of an alliance now. Their strength is my strength. _"I'm working with Severus Snape, leader of the Ashborn, and Harry Potter."

The werewolf paused and stared at him. Then she shook her head. "I know your name. And Harry Potter would never work with _you_."

_Fuck, not this again. _Draco tried to stand straight and stare her down, but that caused her growl to rise, and Draco seemed to remember something long ago, some advice Severus had given him, about not staring wolves or dogs in the eyes, because it would cause them to become more aggressive. "He didn't used to," he said. "But he agreed to become a hostage to the Ashborn, so that he could save the rest of the wizarding world from another war. And that means that he's with us, and that means that he's helping us create this alliance." The _us _might be a slight lie, since Severus hadn't shown any interest in the alliance so far, but it would sound more impressive that way, and Draco was fairly sure Severus would back him rather than let himself be shown up by a werewolf. "He's probably doing it because otherwise he would be bored, but he's doing it."

The werewolf sniffed at him as if he actually stood there instead of in the midst of a dream. Well, for all Draco knew, werewolf noses were sensitive enough to sniff out emotions like that. She ended up taking a step back and scraping slowly in the dirt with her foot, as though she wanted to disturb the leaves as little as possible while she thought. "You believe you're telling the truth."

Draco wondered what she thought he was lying about, and decided that he might as well play another card. "The centaurs are with us already, and bargaining for positions in the alliance."

The werewolf's eyes widened, and her body jerked to stillness. Then she said, "The centaurs. This is news. I must speak to Laughter about it." And she pulled around and ran out of the clearing as though something was chasing her. Draco took a step after her and opened his mouth, but then stopped. He had no name to call, and he would look ridiculous chasing her through the woods when there was no way for him to keep up.

He might not have much right now, with his life changing constantly from hour to hour, but he thought he could keep his dignity.

He opened his eyes and found himself floating to the surface of his sleep slowly. The Forest was still around him, he thought dreamily, the leaves waving and the bright and dark patches between the trees still drifting across his sight—

And someone was knocking on the door.

Draco swung out of bed and stared. He would have felt less surprised, but Severus didn't usually summon him at this time of the day and Potter had no reason to seek him out. Unless something had happened, of course. Something that might have an impact on the alliance. He flung on his boots and hastened to the door. He hadn't bothered to take his clothes off when he went into the dream.

He opened the door, breath already on his lips to command Potter to tell him what was wrong or tell the waiting Ashborn to take him to Severus—

And found Severus waiting there instead.

Draco took a step back and found his arm working as if he would actually shut the door in Severus's face, he was so startled. Then he managed to get control of himself, but he still simply ended up staring. He wondered if he could ask permission to leave for a few minutes, so that he would do something other than swallow and stare, something that would actually give words to Severus's miraculous visit.

He flinched the moment he had that thought, because he could practically hear Potter yelling at him. _Are you stupid? That's the kind of thing he wants you to feel, that you're the unworthy one and the one who should feel as if he's in trouble, when you were doing nothing but sleeping! He's the one who came to your room. Let _him _be the one to explain himself._

It took more courage than Draco had known he had, but he managed to stand up and give a cordial nod to Severus. "What can I do for you?" he asked, which he knew made him sound like a shopkeeper, but was still better than the cringing response he'd wanted to give at first.

Severus stared at him with those fathomless eyes that Draco had found himself mesmerized by when they were imprisoned together. _He's the only one who ever looked at me then like I was worth something._

_ And now, Potter is the only one who does. _Draco couldn't let the past intrude on the present, couldn't let himself be convinced that Severus deserved another chance when Draco hadn't decided to give him one. He settled for leaning on the door and raising one eyebrow, waiting for some sort of response.

"You are well within your rights to leave me standing in the corridor," Severus said at last, his voice deep and quiet. "But I had hoped that you would invite me inside."

Heat rushed up Draco's skin from his throat to his cheeks, and not the kind of heat that Severus usually inspired in him. He wanted to step back, to stammer that Severus didn't have to ask permission to go anywhere inside the Ashborn's fortress, not when he was the one who had ordered the Ashborn to build the bloody thing—

And then Draco paused. That in and of itself was significant, wasn't it? Severus left Draco to his own devices much of the time and commanded him the rest. Draco wasn't allowed to intrude on him in the evenings when Severus had expressed the fact that he would much rather be left alone.

This was new. This was different.

Draco licked his lips, and nodded. He moved out of the way, and Severus stepped inside, turning his head around as though he had never seen the room before and wanted to know where everything was.

Draco looked around, too, and wondered what Severus's critical eyes would make of it. He had tried to arrange his possessions in a way that made sense, in everything from the books on the shelves to the pillows on the bed. But anxiety seared him that Severus would find something out of place, something ungracious or juvenile.

Again, he had to straighten his shoulders and remind himself of what Potter would have said. _He chose to come here, and he's the one who decided to become my lover even though I'm much younger than he is. He could have chosen one of the other Ashborn if he wanted someone closer to him in age._

It was strange, to feel a thin, bright feeling moving through him and realize that it might be _pride. _After everything. After it all. He blinked and stood straighter still, so he felt ready when Severus turned back to him from his inspection of the rooms.

"Have you been unhappy with the introduction of Potter into the Ashborn?"

Draco took a deep breath. He could have said yes or no with equal truth. Potter had smashed everything to pieces. He had made Draco question his personal hero, the one person he knew who had been through the horrors of the Dark Lord's dungeons exactly as he had and survived and made everything better. Severus had banished the Dark Mark, ensured that Draco was surrounded by people who would obey him without question, fed and sheltered him and given him books. He had taken Potter under his control. Potter meant that Draco would never look at that the same way again, with the same untarnished, glittering trust.

But if Potter hadn't come, then nothing would ever have changed, and the alliance wouldn't be on the same footing it was. Draco would never have dared invite the centaurs, for fear of annoying Severus.

"I can find some other means of controlling his friends, if you wish him to go," Severus continued, in a hurried tone. Draco looked at him in wonder. It sounded almost as if Draco's silence had _unnerved _him, and he wanted to get the question out of the way so that he could focus the conversation on practical realities.

"No," Draco said. "I like having him here."

Severus turned to examine the vials of completed potions Draco had sitting on his shelves, with an abstracted frown. It was something he had always done the other times that he came to Draco's rooms, and Draco wouldn't have thought it was strange now.

Except.

Except that this time, Severus's eyes had flashed before he moved away, and Draco knew what that gleam was and recognized it. He had seen it in the mirror often enough, when Severus paid too much attention to his potions or his automatons or other Ashborn who needed their mental bindings renewed.

_Jealousy._

Draco licked his lips. His chest tightened and then loosened, and this time the pride was bright and strong enough to make him feel as though a different kind of flame was shining beneath his skin.

He had a power of his own after all, the kind of power that didn't depend on the centaurs or Potter, or what he might have started or done by contacting the werewolf tonight. The power was personal and between him and Severus.

"I'm happy to have Potter here," he said calmly, when he thought that he could speak in a way that wouldn't make his words tremble with joy and reveal the truth to Severus. "He's made me think about things in a new way. He's inspired me to seek out new projects." He paused, and then, because he couldn't resist the chance to slip a knife into the man who had done it so often to him, he added, "I think you were the one who told me that inspiration is the most valuable thing one person can give another."

Severus's shoulders hunched. For a moment, Draco thought he would strike out, and Draco found himself startlingly prepared for that. He would strike back. He had words and words waiting, ones that would hopefully make Severus reconsider whatever kind of attack he had planned.

"I must consider what you have said," Severus said hoarsely, and turned towards the door.

_What? It's over, just like that? _Draco blinked and followed him. "I don't understand," he said. "Potter has to be here as a hostage because of the Unbreakable Vows."

"Yes, but I had thought of a different means to accomplish the same end, to rid ourselves of him." Severus laid a hand on the door, felt about for a moment as though he didn't remember that it had a handle on this side, and then found it and wrenched it open. "But if you wish him to be here, I will abandon that plan."

Draco had to close his eyes as a pulse of sweetness overwhelmed him. _Yes. I made him rethink what he was going to do. That's the first time I've done that since he set up the Ashborn. _

_The same way that it's the first time he's visited me without prior warning. The first time that I've seen him jealous over me, afraid that someone else would take me away. Because, who could, when only the Ashborn were with us and none of them would desire me except at his command? _

Being in power again, discovering that he had the ability to affect Severus instead of only being affected himself, was a marvelous feeling.

* * *

Severus made sure that he was back in his rooms before he let himself consider the words Draco had spoken. Doing it in front of someone else would probably make him break down, or at least show weakness that—

He was thinking as though he was still among the Death Eaters, where spying eyes would carry any tales they could back to the Dark Lord to break a favorite. Here, the Ashborn were the only ones likely to notice, unless Potter was wandering, and Severus knew that he would have felt Bellatrix's Mark drawing nearer if the latter was the case.

Potter was making him regress.

Potter, and Draco.

Severus shut his eyes, and saw Draco again as he had been just now, his face pale but set, his voice steadier and less caressing than Severus had ever heard it. He had never felt his own desire for Draco as a hindrance. He was a beautiful boy, a beautiful man, an obedient student and servant. Severus could take or leave him as he chose. He was the one who was in control of their relationship, and not Draco.

But now…

Now, Draco had changed when Severus's back was turned, changed rapidly, like a snake shedding an old skin and growing into a new one. He had altered, and Severus found himself as enchanted as though this new Draco was a hypnotic cobra, or one of the artifacts that the Dark Lord had enchanted to enslave the mind of anyone who picked it up.

As though Draco knew Legilimency extensive enough to enslave _him_.

Severus entertained that idea for a time, and then reluctantly put it aside. No. He would not think that Draco had somehow developed that skill. It was far more likely that increased confidence, which Potter had given him, was enough to make Severus notice.

He had not _known _that he desired a confident lover. Yes, sometimes he wearied of Draco's worship of him, but that was uncommon. Most of the time, he basked in the uncomplicated adoration that Draco offered, and when he tired of it, there were no shortage of places he could send Draco away to. His life had at last become what he dreamed it might when he was still a student laboring away in Slytherin.

Well. There were differences. Lily was not with him now, for one thing.

But Lily's son was. And he was challenging things, changing things, introducing new elements into Severus's life that would alter the course of it if he allowed them to continue exactly as they were.

For the moment, Severus decided, feeling cautiously at the thoughts as they grew in his head like new teeth, he would do nothing to change the way that Potter related to Draco. It was making Draco more confident in an odd way, and that made Draco more attractive to Severus in an odd way. He would wait there, and see what happened. And he did not believe that Potter could affect the Ashborn, at least for now, no matter how passionately he wanted to.

He would watch, and wait, and see in what ways he could affect the alliance that Draco was building with the centaurs and perhaps other magical creatures. If he could be more accommodating and gracious than Potter, Draco would turn to him in time, and the accusation from Potter that Severus had no respect for Draco's hobbies would fall to dust.

But with Potter himself…

Severus felt his lips thinning, and nodded.

Yes, with Potter himself, other measures would be needed.


	11. Sending Gifts

Thank you again for all the reviews!

_Chapter Eleven—Sending Gifts_

"I have never heard of a werewolf leader called Laughter."

Draco concealed a sigh. Potter was the one to say what he wanted to, grinning at Kleianthe and taking a bite of the apple that he'd brought out to the garden. "And because you've never heard of him, or her, or whatever, then they must not exist?"

Kleianthe's nostrils flared, and for a moment Draco actually thought she would dance backwards and paw the air at them. "This alliance is a serious matter," she said. "You must be careful not to insult us."

Potter nodded, not looking at all abashed. "But just because we're serious doesn't mean that we have to be humorless."

Draco watched him from the corner of his eye. He had thought that Potter seemed less tense, less preoccupied, in the last few days—more loose and lazy and open. Draco would have thought Parseltongue lessons with Severus would have the opposite effect on him, but then again, Potter never did what anyone would have expected. Maybe knowing who his enemies were had that effect on him instead.

Potter caught Draco's eye and raised his own brows questioningly. Draco shook his head violently and turned away. He _hated _the way that Potter sometimes looked at him, as if he expected things out of him that Draco didn't want to give, or didn't know how to give. It wasn't that great an annoyance, truthfully, but everything seemed to cut deeply into Draco now. Anger became rage, irritation hatred.

"We wish to be present when the fosters that the werewolves may send you arrive," said Kleianthe.

"Are your people enemies?" Potter asked in interest. "I mean, I know that you live in the Forbidden Forest together, but do they hunt you or anything? I've never heard of that."

Kleianthe lowered her head, the iron chain on her wrist flashing as she crossed her arms over her chest. "And because you have never heard of it, that means it must not exist," she said. Draco almost wanted to applaud. There was a neat turning of Potter's words back on him.

Potter, though, just grinned at her and gave her a little salute of the kind that a duelist might use to acknowledge that his opponent had got in a spell to sting him. "Not really. I just wanted to know. There's so much that we don't know about you. I only took three years of Care of Magical Creatures, and we mostly covered the pets that Hagrid bred. Or unicorns, once. Nothing like centaurs."

"We would not fit in such a class. We are ourselves."

Draco didn't recognize the voice at first, and looked around in wonder. Then he realized it was Thera, the other adult centaur who almost never spoke. She had pressed forwards and stood next to Kleianthe, eyes wide with what looked like awe at her own daring.

"Then you can talk to us, if you wish, and tell us the true state of things." Potter at once turned to face her, reaching out with one hand and then pulling it back as if he had just remembered that she might not like that. He clasped his hands together behind his back instead and turned to study one of the scrubby pine trees that grew in this garden. Draco stared. Had he thought about the gestures he was making, or were they the result of instinct? He thought that Potter might actually end up a good diplomat, if so. "Do werewolves hunt centaurs? Do they trouble them? I've met centaurs like Bane who thought that killing me simply for being human was a good idea, and werewolves are human most of the month."

"It is not that simple," Kleianthe said, taking over and baring her teeth at Thera when she tried to reply. Draco clucked his tongue thoughtfully. So it wasn't just fear of humans that kept Thera silent most of the time, then. "There are contradictions and complexities and contacts between us that you can never understand."

"Not if you don't explain them, no." Potter beamed mildly up at Kleianthe.

Draco began to feel left out, and decided to draw the conversation back to his dream. "Did the werewolf I described sound familiar to either of you?"

Kleianthe shook her head hard enough to snap her hair behind her like a mane, but Thera responded. "Yes. I think her name is Sunflower. I've seen her hunting along the borders of our territory before, but she always turned away when I tried to talk with her. I think she's shyer and more disdainful than most of them."

"Then why did I end up in her dream?" Draco asked, puzzled. It made sense that he'd spoken to Sidereal, since he considered himself a leader of the centaurs—or at least Kleianthe and Thera referred to him that way, and he hadn't disclaimed it when Draco met him—but a random werewolf was odd.

"I don't know." Thera braced herself and swished her tail hard when Kleianthe glanced her way, but didn't shut up. "Sometimes, though, I've seen her observing me when she thinks no one is watching, and following some of the younger foals from place to place to watch them shoot. I think she's curious about us and wishes for some more extensive contact."

"It isn't your place to offer that opinion unless you're asked for it, you know," Kleianthe said.

"My opinion?" Thera stamped a hoof. "Sidereal chose both of us for this journey. Do you want me to go back home?"

Kleianthe looked taken aback, and shuddered her skin as if to remove flies. "No. But be careful of what you say about werewolves."

"I thought you were supposed to give us information," Potter pointed out, with that same fearless confidence that Draco admired and found disturbing. "Not conceal it from us. Or does this relate to a private centaur quarrel?"

He'd given them an out, Draco knew, but neither of them would take it. The centaurs had so far been the epitome of courtesy and reserve, discussing the alliance with only small forays into other topics. Now that they were arguing in front of someone else and Potter was being the polite one—with Draco helping—they didn't want to refuse an opportunity to get back on the same footing.

"It has to do with the way that some of the centaurs think about werewolves," Kleianthe said, staring at the ground and slowly scraping a hoof back and forth as if she were drawing a fascinating pattern in the dirt. "As you say, they are human for most of the month. There have been times that we killed one, mistaking it for a human intruder into the territory. New werewolves or those who hate their beast forms don't always show the nails and the fangs and the golden eyes that some of them do. And then there have been demands for compensation—the werewolves will accept money or rare meat as a weregild—"

Draco was pleased to see that Potter looked confused at that word, at least. It was good to discover something he didn't know.

"And some of our people, like Sidereal, have agreed to that while others argued that it was the responsibility of the werewolves to keep their new ones away from their territory, if they were so concerned about the consequences of intrusion." Kleianthe grimaced as if she'd bitten into a sour apple and shook her head. "You can imagine how well that has gone over with some of those who wanted to pay the weregild."

"What faction do you belong to?" Draco asked, after waiting for Potter to ask it and being disappointed. It did them little to know about centaur politics in the abstract unless they also knew what political orientation the ones they dealt with subscribed to.

"The young werewolves have never started the trouble," Thera said quietly. "They overran our borders in ignorance. And the other members of the packs have sometimes sacrificed people they didn't like that way, or ones who might have challenged them and won. Let us pay a weregild if we must. It is the least we can do."

Kleianthe didn't answer, but the pace of her tail was frantic.

"Should we not have contacted the werewolves?" Potter asked. He could make bluntness a weapon for himself, then, not just a liability. Draco would remember it. "I thought they were your preferred partners in the alliance, more than the merfolk, at least."

"I have known two centaurs who died at the hands of werewolves," Kleianthe answered, her voice quiet, passionless. "They are not the innocent victims that Thera paints them as."

"Some of them are," Thera said. "The ones who tend to die are. The leaders are crafty enough to hold back and let someone else take the blame."

Kleianthe reared.

Draco knew there was probably an attack coming on Thera if she planned to make an attack at all, but he couldn't help himself. He scrambled out of the way, his wand in his hand and a defensive charm on his lips. Severus had had a few fights to win when he wanted to take the Death Eaters and mold them into the Ashborn, and this reminded Draco too much of that for him to be comfortable.

Potter stepped between him and the arguing centaurs, lifted a shield that sparked and looked as if it might be an offensive spell at the same time, and asked, "Could you please stop this? You're scaring the children."

Draco ground his teeth, hating that Potter decided he was too young to matter because he'd had a _normal _reaction to a fight—

Then he realized that Potter was looking at the centaur fillies, rather than Draco. The young centaurs were huddled in the corner of the garden, their arms around each other and their eyes so wide that Draco winced. He could remember looking like that, and he hoped he would never have to again, no matter what else he did.

Kleianthe crashed to the ground and turned away, rattling her arm hard enough that the iron chain sang. Thera stood where she was, watching Kleianthe with a weary expression on her face.

"So far," Potter said into the ensuing silence, "you've emphasized again and again that we don't know enough, that we can't hope to construct an alliance anything like the old one if we don't learn more. But when we try, then you bring up centaur political arguments in the middle of the garden where the point is that you came to live and foster your children in peace."

"We did ask them to explain," Draco murmured to the back of his neck. Standing this close, he could smell Potter's scent. It was disturbing. Most of the time, he was only near enough to someone else to smell Severus's.

"Yes, but there's a difference between explanation and violence," Potter said. His voice continued to scrape along. "Well? What do you have to say for yourselves? Is this alliance at an end, and are you going to leave and refuse to talk to each other the way that you should, being allies? The way that you insisted Draco and I talk to each other?"

Draco opened his mouth to say that Potter had no right to call him by his first name, then closed it again, feeling the heat of embarrassment in his cheeks. _Way to undermine the alliance if you had spoken, stupid._

Kleianthe stared at the grass. Thera remained gazing at her face, although she said nothing, and Draco suddenly wondered whether the person who spoke all the time might be the weaker one in an alliance after all.

"Now," Draco said. He hadn't known he was going to say anything until he did. His voice had the same calm tone that it had with Severus the other night. _If you use your words wisely, you don't need to use them all the time. _"Are you going to do this without the screaming and kicking? If not, perhaps we should start negotiating with your daughters."

Thera smiled. Kleianthe finally looked up and turned away so that she was looking at Thera instead of either one of them. That was fine with Draco. He had tried to get used to it, the way the centaurs went bare-breasted all the time, but it was difficult.

"Well?" Potter asked, when some time had passed and nothing but the singing of birds and the chirping of insects filled the garden.

Kleianthe sighed hard enough to make branches rustle and put her hand out. Thera clasped it quickly, glance flickering across her face as if she thought that Kleianthe would seize her and pull her close to crush her throat. Not a bad tactic, Draco thought. Usually, he was poor at seeing chances like that unless Severus had pointed them out to him or he'd specifically read about them in books. He would have to remember this one.

"I am sorry," Kleianthe said. "I should have—should remembered that this was an alliance and that we would settle the issue of werewolves killing centaurs if we manage to bring them into it."

"Yes, you should have," Thera said, and nothing more. Kleianthe's back stiffened. Draco moved cautiously away from those hooves that she had cocked in the grass right now. No rule saying that centaurs couldn't kick back at people standing on the ground, even if horses didn't do it most of the time.

"Thera?" Potter's voice had a laugh in the back of it. "Don't you think that you apologizing would help, too?"

"If I must," Thera said, and then gave a quick, dazzling smile that Draco knew he wanted to see again. Yes, there was a reason that Sidereal had sent both of them, and simply because Thera had let Kleianthe take the lead didn't mean it _must _be that way. Out of all the insights to come out of the morning, Draco thought that one the most valuable.

"I understand you," she told Kleianthe. "But I think it best to take the middle road and hope for the future. Otherwise, it will poison the alliance from the beginning, as we are one of the founding species."

Kleianthe jerked her head up and down in what might have been a nod or a mere irritated gesture, and then turned away. Draco watched her as she began to graze, tearing leaves from a young tree. She had to stretch her neck to reach them, and chew harder than normal to swallow them. She channeled tension into eating, then, and into effort. He would have to remember that as they dealt with her.

"Good," Potter said briskly to Thera. "Do you have any other ideas for who we should contact next?"

Thera nodded. "No vampires currently share the Forest with us, and they suffered under the Ministry. They were allies of He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, after all, and most people will remember that—"

"They weren't," Draco interrupted. He knew that he had only ever seen one vampire working with the Dark Lord, and that had been when he wanted a few special missions accomplished. No groups had come and subordinated themselves. Draco had not even been sure that organized groups of unregistered vampires existed. That seemed to be a tale that people liked to scare children with.

_And I'm not a child. No matter what some people think._

"Or will think they remember that," Thera finished smoothly. "They would not be willing to listen to a pure-blood, though."

"Why not?" That startled Draco. From what he had read, it was pure-bloods who had masterminded the alliance, and Muggleborns could fit in only if they accepted the rules, passed several tests, and agreed to have children who would be half-blood at the very least. The issue then had not been the genetic or even the magical component so much as the fact that they wouldn't have spent their childhood around other members of the alliance, and ideas, such as multiple marriages, that came easily to people reared in that way had proven foreign to them. There was always some jealous Muggleborn, the histories had assured Draco, either demanding greater individual attention than they had a right to or wanting some lover to be exclusively faithful to them when their other lovers hadn't agreed on that.

"Because it was pure-bloods who cast them out of the last alliance before it ended." Thera eyed him. "The vampires were denied their required amount of blood after a war with a magical community on the Continent. Perhaps they should not have pressed the claim so strongly, when most of the surviving wizards were still exhausted and recovering, but then again, the wizards should have thought of that probable consequence before they had a war. As if one _must _have one." Her tail swished, and Draco thought the words aimed at Kleianthe as much as anyone else there. "So. The pure-bloods declared the vampires had violated the terms of the alliance when they took a few less than willing victims—although some half-bloods had offered to help the vampires—and severed their ties to them. That was the beginning of the end, truly, although the desire to pursue individual power for the family did not help, either. When the wizards could turn on one magical creature species, of course the others began to wonder how long it was before they were next."

"Would they accept a half-blood negotiator, then?" Potter's eyes were heavy-lidded and thoughtful.

"You've barely learned how to dream so that you can reach a magical creature," Draco said, sneering at him in a way that didn't seem to impress Potter. Draco knew he hadn't put much effort into it, but he would still have appreciated more of a reaction.

"That doesn't matter," Potter said. "It worked. If you tell me what to say, then I think I can make the vampires listen to me."

"What makes you assume that I know anything about them?" Draco sneered again. "Wizards who willingly let vampires drink their blood are likely to end up as those who will permit _anyone _to touch them."

"What makes you assume that I was talking to you?" Potter shot back, and faced Thera. "What else do you know? More history than anyone else here, it seems."

Kleianthe loudly crushed a twig with her hoof, but didn't turn around. Draco knew how she felt, and he would have turned his back in the same way if he thought Potter would pay him any attention.

"That the vampires consider themselves to be ill-treated by the Ministry," Thera answered, speaking thoughtfully. "Even more so than the werewolves, because the Ministry has made more of an effort to exterminate vampire flocks than the packs that live in the Forest, and they are dangerous all the time, not simply at the full moon."

Draco could have told her something about how dangerous werewolves were, as he thought of Fenrir Greyback, but he held his tongue. Why should he let them have the benefit of his expertise?

_Because you are in the same alliance. And quarreling and arguing does no one any good, in the end._

"So they would respond to the offer of having somewhere to go that wasn't the Ministry?" Potter nodded. "I can see that. And it's not as though they don't deserve some of the respect the stories talk about. If they can control their bloodthirst."

"Some can, some cannot." Thera smiled at Potter. "But that should be of little concern to you in a dream."

_Oh, for fuck's sake. _"You do remember that vampires are capable of possessing someone's mind if they can see into their eyes?" Draco interrupted loudly. "I would think that would still apply in a dream. For all we know, the vampire might be able to ride someone's mind back and control their bodies in the waking world."

Potter glanced at him, but the light in his eyes was dull, his attention far away and unconcentrated on Draco. That made Draco want to tear something apart. "Does the possession work like Legilimency? On the same principles?"

That was a more sensible question than Draco had expected. "Yes," he said. "Vampires have the natural ability to perform Legilimency, but they don't need a wand and they don't need permission and they can use your memories to perform certain tasks."

"Then it isn't a problem," Potter said coolly. "Legilimency doesn't work on me anymore."

He turned back to speaking to Thera, leaving Draco to stare at the back of his neck and wonder what he _meant_. No one was immune to Legilimency. Some people thought they were, but in practice all that meant was that it was a bit harder to get past their mental shields and find some specific memories. An Occlumens who was careless or tired could be as vulnerable to the intrusion of a skilled Legilimens as anyone else.

Draco shuddered. _Or when you're exhausted with pain, and you keep sobbing that you're sorry for your failure, and the Dark Lord tells you that you have to look up and meet his eyes again…_

"Malfoy. Malfoy! Are you all right?"

Startled, Draco nearly moved away. Potter was shaking Draco's head on his neck, and his eyes were wide and worried. Draco lifted his hand as if to swat Potter's away, but found himself covering Potter's fingers with his own instead.

"That looked like a memory that was too strong for you." Potter leaned forwards as if he thought that Draco had been overdosing on Dreamless Sleep and wanted to see the telltale red cracks in the whites of his eyes. "Something from the war, probably. I get them sometimes. Are you all right?"

Draco swallowed and then clasped his fingers down harder. "No one is immune to Legilimency," he said. "I think you should reconsider going after the vampires and listen to what _I _have to say. I've seen some of the weaker people the Dark Lord taught Legilimency use it to break a mind. You can't resist a vampire you contact in a dream. You might not be there physically, but they'll be used to dealing with a mental and spiritual realm, and more powerful than you can imagine."

Potter stepped back, but dropped his hand so that he could squeeze Draco's arm. "I don't think you know what I mean," he said, which might be true, but was still annoying enough to make Draco scowl at him. Potter merrily ignored that. "I don't think I'm immune because of Occlumency shields or any particular skill. It's just my fucked-up memories from the war that guard my mind. Snape's tried more than once to read my mind since I've been here, and I wouldn't be surprised if he's the most powerful Legilimens still alive. I'll be careful around the vampires, but I won't be helpless."

"Memories?" Draco shook his head, not sure what he was hearing. "That's impossible."

"It ought to be," Potter said simply. "I'm used to the impossible being possible around me, all the time." He nodded at Thera. "And if what she said about pure-bloods is true, then I really ought to be the one to go. You would be in more danger than I would, even if you know how to hold Occlumency shields."

"And you care about my safety," Draco muttered, but he found that he didn't have the will to make it a question.

Potter glanced at him and raised his eyebrows. "Well, yes, of course. The people in this garden are the only ones who keep me from dying of boredom."

Draco nodded. He didn't know what he felt right now, and he wouldn't explore it. It would only either tangle him in complexities he couldn't navigate or it would weigh him down with thoughts that he didn't want to think. "Fine. Then will you try to contact the vampires tonight?"

"If Thera can tell me where they dwell." Potter turned back to her and asked a few more questions. Kleianthe's stamping grew faster in response, but she didn't turn around, so Draco reckoned she wasn't as irritated by Thera being the one to offer that information as she appeared.

He himself was…

He was pleased that Potter took enough of an interest in him to save his life. But all Potter's motives for that seemed shallow, not the kind of deep and inherent nobility that he would have expected from a Gryffindor hero.

_On the other hand, if he did show you that kind of heroism, then you would mock him for it and tell him that he didn't know what kind of person you were. Perhaps it's for the best that he only wants to save you because he's bored._

And now Draco had a new goal: to prove to Potter that he wasn't only a helpless child or damsel who needed to be saved.

* * *

Harry stopped and stared. Bellatrix bumped into his back and stopped with a grunt. She no longer seemed to have malice shining out of her eyes when he asked her a simple question, and she no longer objected to what he did as long as it wasn't stopping to talk to an Ashborn. Harry reckoned that was one of those consequences of the better treatment that Snape had promised him; he no longer looked through Bellatrix's eyes or touched her Mark to spy on Harry.

That didn't explain the thing in the middle of his bed, though.

After a few seconds, when it hadn't done anything, Harry moved forwards and regarded it. The reflective, shining silvery paper, bound with a green bow, stared back. Harry would have thought it was a birthday or Christmas gift from one of his friends, but both of those were months away, and Harry knew that Snape would never have allowed a gift like this to simply pass through the owl post. It was too large.

"Go on, then."

Harry stared suspiciously over his shoulder. Had Bellatrix just urged him towards the gift? It seemed so, because she was the only one there and so the only one who could have spoken, although the voice hadn't sounded much like hers.

_Probably Snape speaking through her. _That made it all the more imperative, in Harry's view, for him not to just go ahead and touch the package. He circled around the bed instead, studying the corners for some sign of something sharp or dangerous buried beneath the paper. There was nothing. The package was perfectly square. It was probably a box inside.

Harry grimaced and rubbed his left shoulder reflexively. He had reason to know how dangerous a simple box was, at least when it carried a Horcrux.

"Well?" That was Bellatrix, and she had taken up a posture near the door, leaning on it and staring at Harry intently.

Harry shrugged back to her and cast a spell that would at least tell him if any hexes were on the box. No, it seemed not. A few more incantations to reveal more potent curses produced nothing, either.

Well, then.

Harry licked his lips and reached out, ripping a long strip of the shiny paper away from the side in a flickering motion that barely let his fingers brush the box.

It tore. The surface of a box did shine through, but a much flimsier one than Harry had thought would come out. Not wood or stone or even lacquer, but a paper box of the kind that you might get from a Muggle shop. Harry shook his head and blinked. Had someone sent him a Muggle toy? Why?

But standing there wouldn't tell him why, so he gingerly tore off a few more strips of the paper.

The box underneath looked to be plain white cardboard, with the edges of gauzy tissue sticking out from under the top. Harry poked it. It made no noise, even when he pushed it so that it slid across the bed.

He readied his wand and flipped the top off, then jerked himself backwards before any explosion could pour into his face.

Under the lid was only something that was pretty obviously flat and soft beneath another layer of paper. Nothing blasted him or poisoned him, no matter how long he stood there. At last, Harry sighed, acknowledged to himself that Snape probably didn't want to lose a hostage, and used his wand to edge the paper up.

It was a mass of grey fur. Then Harry moved it, and it was a jumper of some kind, like the ones that Mrs. Weasley sent him for every holiday, except grey, and ridiculously soft and warm-looking. Harry picked it up and stared at it.

He had no way of knowing that the size was right, although it looked like it. And he had no reason to appreciate the ridiculous, sliding material under his fingers. Cashmere? He had no idea. He had no idea if that was even something they made jumpers out of.

The rest of the box, when he looked through it, turned out to be more of the same. A pair of Muggle jeans that looked as if they would fit him. Another jumper, black. A few ordinary shirts, black and white and grey, neutral colors. And at the bottom, a pair of boots that looked as if they could pass through swamps and still come out neat and shining.

Harry rolled his eyes and set the boots aside. Then he turned and faced Bellatrix. "I know you're there, Snape," he said. "And I think it's creepy, for the record, that you look through the eyes of your Ashborn like that."

* * *

Touching Bellatrix's Mark, touching her mind, looking through her eyes, Severus wondered for a moment how Potter had known it was him. Then he shook his head. He did not have time to indulge questions like that. Potter had not reacted to the gifts as expected, and so he would ask that, instead.

"The clothes are not your size?" he asked. "Or not in colors you like?" He had thought neutral colors were best, but on the other hand, given the huge and jewel-toned murals that Potter had covered his walls with, perhaps it would have been best to choose garish red and gold and purple after all.

"That has nothing to do with it," Potter said, with a faint, irritated twitch of his head, as if he didn't grasp why Severus would have the need to ask _that _question, either. "The point is that you can't bribe me."

"The clothes are not a bribe," Severus said. "You need do nothing for me in return. They are a gift. You need new clothes." Potter _did_. He had brought a wardrobe with him, of course, but they were a mixture of re-sized and re-patched school robes and Muggle clothes that overlapped the boy in waves. Severus had thought it best to start there, as it was a material object that Potter could accept and appreciate, and his reaction to it would tell Severus much about his reaction to other tactics he could try.

"Right," Potter said. "I've heard that before, from the Ministry and from the Death Eaters and even from Voldemort." Severus did not know if he prevented his flinch from working its way through Bellatrix's body; his control was not that precise, whatever Potter thought. "There's always a hook somewhere."

"Not this time." And Severus was telling the truth. It would have availed him nothing to set a hook, when what he wanted access to were Potter's _unmediated _responses, swirling out of him as he wore the clothes. And perhaps Draco's responses when he saw Potter in the new clothes. Severus had had enough of Potter changing the currents of his life. He would change a few of his own, and see what happened.

"No."

Severus came back from his own speculations, deep thoughts that Potter could never understand, in time to see him shove the clothes across the bed to the edge with nothing more than a blast of wandless power. "Pardon?" Severus asked, his rough edges smoothed out by Bellatrix's voice. This was an advantage to speaking through someone else; less of his expression and telltale emotions showed.

"I said_, no_." Potter's eyes focused on him, flaring, furious, the eyes of a wild creature, and Severus was abruptly reminded that Potter had spent most of the past three years running from people who wanted to capture him, being captured, surviving torture and abuse, killing, and destroying the Horcruxes of the most powerful Dark Lord in fifty years. "There's always a catch somewhere. Take it and choke on it."

Severus waited until his immediate angry response had subsided. Something that strong would show through the flesh mask that Bellatrix had become, no matter how he much he hated it. "I am telling the truth. Do not disdain my gifts because of where they come from."

Potter stared at him, then snorted. "What better reason is there to disdain them?" This time, his power threw the clothes at Bellatrix.

Severus fumbled for a moment, caught between his own reflexes and Bellatrix's ancient instincts and the ones he had drilled into her, to respond if a threat came flying at her. In moments, he had them back under control, but by that point, a jumper was draped across his face and the shoes had thumped painfully into his legs. Her legs. It was hard to tell the difference between one body and another, in this state.

"No," Potter repeated softly, his voice absolutely clear. "I'll eat your food and live in the rooms that you give me. Those are necessities. Food, shelter, water. But there's no need for clothes like _that_." He gestured at the ones on the floor, and then lay down triumphantly in the middle of the bed, as though taking up more space than he needed was a sport.

Severus stared at him, still caught speechless. He had Potter's reaction to the gifts, yes, but they made no sense. There was no reference to anything Severus had done to him since he had come among the Ashborn, or even something Severus had done to him in Hogwarts.

This was refusal of…everything.

Severus thought he understood better, now, why Potter's presence in the Ashborn's fortress was changing both him and Draco. There were no _echoes _to Potter. None of the normal human motivations that Severus was used to dealing with, greed or longing to survive or longing for revenge, were there. Potter might want to stay alive, as he had showed by surrendering to a hostage bargain rather than simply fighting Severus to the death, but not enough to really mind it if he died.

Potter let out a soft sigh and shook his head. "Are you going to follow Draco in thinking I'm suicidal or something? I'm not. I don't plan on flinging myself dramatically from the top of a tower or getting the centaurs angry and letting them kick me to death. I agreed to be your hostage, and I will be. But I didn't agree to be your plaything, and if you try to treat me like one, then I'll refuse to go along with it."

Severus withdrew silently from Bellatrix's mind. It amused him to think of Potter talking to her long after Severus had gone, and insulting her with savage words that were meant for her master's ears, even if he would not be there to hear it.

He opened his eyes in his lab, and seated himself in his chair, clapping absently. The deer automaton brought him a vial of Calming Draught, and Severus drank it with care. That was the best way to let the potion work on his mind as well as relax his body and ease his tension.

Very well. He had avoided the truth long enough, let it chase him in circles like a stubborn Kneazle who did not want to let its owner heal a cut.

He could not bribe Potter. He could not make gifts to him and get the boy to trust him that way. He could not successfully compete for Draco's attention with Potter when he knew so little about the reasons Draco had begun to change in the first place.

There was little he could do if he did not accept that he had failed so far, and that honesty might be the only course.

Well, then. He would leave Potter alone for now, but behave differently to Draco. Severus suspected one of two things would happen. Either Potter would stomp up to him demanding to know what he intended for Draco and how he could stop it, or Potter would learn to live with him.

It might take a long time. But Severus had flailed about as though he had only a few days for long enough now. They had the rest of their lives, as Potter would doubtless remind him. Potter was a hostage here, he was not leaving, and his presence would neither fit neatly into Severus's established routine nor prove easy to conquer.

Severus clapped his hands for the deer automaton again, and gave it certain orders. Perhaps Draco would not enjoy Severus's company at the moment, but he was unlikely to follow Potter's example and refuse his gifts.

* * *

Draco stared at the mug of spiced and steaming hot chocolate between the silver antlers of the stag kneeling in front of him. The deer remained in the same place as he took out his wand and performed several passes above the cup, looking for traces of the common potions that he knew Severus preferred for enslaving minds.

No traces came up. The chocolate was exactly what it seemed to be, a gift, and the smell of his favorite spices and the heat on his hand when he reached out was making Draco hungry just standing here.

"Fine," he snapped at the stag, although he knew it wouldn't speak to him and he knew that Severus couldn't look through its eyes as he could look through the eyes of the Ashborn. "Tell him that I accept, but I think his messenger is creepy." He snatched the mug away, stepped back, and kicked the door shut.

Then he put the mug on the shelf next to the bed and stared at it until it grew cold. A Warming Charm would make it steam again, of course, but Draco held off for the moment, closing his eyes.

What was Severus playing at? Was this in the nature of a—a courting gift, or something more drastic? If Draco drank it, then would he wake up to find himself imprisoned in a tower like some maiden in a fairy tale?

_No. I doubt Severus is that desperate. He has to know that that would make him lose me forever._

Draco licked his lips, then nodded decisively, although who was there to see his decisive nod, he didn't know. He wanted Severus back. He wanted to matter to him. He wanted to matter to Potter, too, but that was a different kind of mattering. Potter was above him, or acted that way, because he just _did_. Severus had once been warm to him, and Draco wanted the warmth again.

Perhaps that was even what Severus had been trying to say by making Draco's gift a gift of heat, come to think of it.

Draco cast the charm, picked up the mug, and toasted the empty room, wondering if there was another way that Severus could see him. Possibly. Or perhaps he would be satisfied with the stag's empty antlers when it came back to his rooms.

"Here's to you," he told Severus, and drank the mug.

It was delicious, and filled his mouth with tingling warmth, and made him neither sleepy nor sick. Draco didn't think the vast, nostalgic yearning that filled him at that the result of any potion.


	12. Visits Paid

Thank you again for all the reviews!

_Chapter Twelve—Visits Paid_

"Harry."

Hermione just whispered the word as she took him in her arms and held him, but Harry heard it. Then Ron hugged him from behind, and Harry closed his eyes and let himself rest on his friends.

Just for a little while. Just for that moment. Most of the time, he wasn't even aware of how much he missed them, because he couldn't be. He couldn't spend his time yearning after his old life, or he would go mad. Or he would start looking around for new friends who could give him the same support, and there would be none. The day that he started thinking he could rely on Malfoy or Snape the same way he relied on Ron and Hermione, then he would know that he had crossed the line into delusion.

_That's the way my life is. And if I thought that I couldn't bear up without them, then I shouldn't have chosen this kind of life._

Hermione finally stepped back, wiping tears away from her eyes. Ron clapped him on the shoulder and moved around in front of him, to sit down at the table Snape had given them, the same one as before. "We think we might have a way that could free you, mate," he said.

Harry stared at them. Hermione was sitting very upright, hands clasped in front of her and eyes glowing. Harry shook his head. "He's listening in, remember? Nothing you say can possibly surprise Snape."

"That doesn't matter," Ron said. "Look, he made this deal in the first place because he wanted you as a hostage, right? Well, all we had to do was come up with something he wanted more."

"And what would that be?" Harry sat down carefully at the table, stifling the urge to look around for spying eyes. He knew where those eyes were, in any case, in the windows that overlooked the courtyard and behind the doors that opened onto it. Staring at them would only make it more obvious that they were there.

But he had no idea what his friends could possibly have come up with, clever though they were. The Ashborn were good servants. Snape obviously had no trouble acquiring Potions ingredients or the other things that he needed to brew them. Malfoy was his lover, and the Unbreakable Vows meant that people wouldn't constantly attack him or his Ashborn. There was nothing Harry could think of, short of using Time-Turners, and he doubted there were any of those left. Voldemort would probably have found them and used them to hide his Horcruxes, if that was so.

Hermione leaned forwards, smiling. "He still has to publish under a pseudonym," she murmured. "Some people know that he controls the Ashborn, some people know that he killed Dumbledore, some people think he's dead and hate him, but whatever the reason, he can't use his own name when he publishes. Don't you think that _kills _him? He's a proud man. He would want to be acknowledged for all the clever things he's done in his field, and no one will as long as they think of him as a traitor."

Harry frowned and scratched the back of his head. "Well, okay, I could see that. But how can we redeem his name? Is that what you're thinking of? I don't think we could make it work, no matter how much we might want to."

Hermione sniffed. "Not all right away, no. What I'm thinking of is a long and complicated process. But it would take a few steps, and then we could ask for more freedom for you. Maybe you and—and Malfoy could come visit the Weasleys." She grimaced as if she was biting into a sour apple. "And then we could ask for a few more visits, and then we could ask for you to spend more time away."

Harry had to close his eyes. He knew that he would show some emotion he probably shouldn't, or even cry, if he didn't. "I—that sounds wonderful," he whispered. "Hermione. Can you possibly manage it?"

"Not only that, I'm going to," Hermione said. "I never would have said it if I didn't think I could, Harry."

Harry nodded and opened his eyes. "Fine. How?"

"She's going to mention that she learned a lot from the notes that Snape left behind at Hogwarts," Ron said, his voice bubbling over with excitement. "Hermione's publishing in the Potions journals, too. She's not very respected right now, but there's some interest. She'll keep mentioning the notes, and then she'll mention some of the experimental potions, and she'll keep introducing his name wherever and whenever she can."

Harry had to smile. "I never thought that I would see you so enthusiastic about anything concerning Snape, Ron," he murmured.

Ron waved his hand. "Hey, as long as Hermione isn't fantasizing about him in any other way than just talking about his potions notes and wishing that she had access to the full things—ouch!"

Hermione had pushed him on the shoulder, almost hard enough to knock him to the ground. "You should consider what _else _I might fantasize about," she told Ron darkly, and then turned back to Harry. "Anyway. We have it worked out. We're going to work on rehabilitating Snape's name as a Potions master. I don't think we can make him a war hero, but on the other hand, we don't have to. I doubt he'd care if we could. So we can decide whether he should be honored as someone who was a genius brewer, or someone who still is. He has to be the one to make the decision."

Harry swallowed. Yes, he thought it could work. It had to gall Snape that any notice he had gained for being more than a spy and teacher had died when Dumbledore did. If Hermione's plan worked, then Snape had to care more about getting his name back then about keeping Harry here and making him odd gifts while he did.

Surely.

The more Harry thought about it, the more he thought it might be workable. There were so few people here whose opinions could make a difference to Snape. Malfoy would probably always think about him too much no matter what Harry did, and the Ashborn would notice what they were told to notice and nothing else. But the wider world was something else. Encourage that to look kindly on Snape, and he might let Harry go. He wouldn't care whether or not the wizarding world hated him as long as they feared him.

Harry could go _home_. He could leave Malfoy to build the pure-blood alliance with the magical creatures, since he had to be better at it anyway. The centaurs were well on their way to not fearing humans any longer, and Malfoy could find some way to contact the vampires that didn't involve Harry—

Then he paused and buried his head in his hands.

"Harry?" Hermione reached out and put a hand on his arm. "What is it?"

Harry grimaced. "You know how tightly Snape controls the Ashborn," he said. He could feel them nodding. He'd mentioned it often enough in his letters. "I don't know if I can persuade him to change that, but I have to try. I want to try. I haven't really said much about it so far. What happens if I leave? They're just left locked in their minds forever? And Malfoy. The same thing could happen to him."

"But why do you _care_?" Ron insisted, reaching out and pulling Harry's hand from his face so that he could stare into Harry's eyes. "It's not like they're your friends."

Harry shook his head. He didn't know if he had the words.

But he would have to find them, because Hermione was leaning forwards in interest, too, and there was a brightness about her eyes that Harry didn't trust. She might start crying, and he knew that he really couldn't take that if she did. He swallowed and said, "I—I can't leave them here. Not like this. Malfoy is starting to come out from under Snape's domination, but I don't think that will last if I go. And some of the Ashborn are the ones who might need that mental control, like Bellatrix or Fenrir Greyback, but not all of them. They deserve to have their minds back. They deserve to make the choice between good and evil."

"Harry." Hermione sounded troubled. "I think we could get Snape to agree to letting you go if we rehabilitated his name, or we could get him to agree to releasing the Ashborn. But not both."

Ron wasn't as gentle. "You're always sacrificing yourself for other people," he told Harry angrily, leaning forwards, right into his face. "But you don't _owe these people anything. _They didn't follow you in the war. They didn't fight beside you. They weren't even innocent victims that got caught up in it. Malfoy tried to kill Dumbledore, and Snape _actually did. _How can you just forget about that?"

Harry winced. So that was it. That was what he looked like to people outside the tight little world of the Ashborn. He had forgotten about the past already and was trying to find some way to justify his sympathy for Snape and Malfoy, just so that he could live with himself and his new life.

But that was as impossible as just walking away was. He had to remember what they were, that he hadn't chosen this life because he wanted it. He had to endure, not give in and not rebel. Doing either would be like letting the Dursleys matter more to him during the summer than the wizarding world did.

"Sorry, you're right," he said. He tried not to think about Malfoy, and the angry words he had, and the strange sliding moods, and the way his face had looked when Harry had stepped between him and Kleianthe when she reared. Malfoy wasn't his friend. He wasn't his ally.

Except that he was, if the pure-blood alliance really held true and Harry was involved more in it than just to relieve his boredom.

Harry ground his teeth. The way Malfoy had described the old alliances sounded like a swamp to him; once you were in it, you could never get out. And it would happen with the new one, too, unless he remembered who his real friends were and what his real goals were. He was here to keep the peace, and he would never leave unless he had some means of assuring that would happen. But on the other hand, he wasn't here to make friends, and he couldn't let that happen either.

"We'll try," he repeated, more firmly. "If Snape accepts it, great. If not, we'll try something else."

Hermione squealed and hugged him. Ron reached out to clasp his hands, warmth rising in his eyes.

Harry hugged Hermione back, and took Ron's hand, and tried not to feel like a traitor. A traitor to what, exactly?

* * *

Severus leaned back on his chair and closed his eyes. There were visions in his head, visions of the flickering pages of Potions journals and the neat handwriting that Granger had always used on her essays when she was a student at Hogwarts.

If he could have that, his reputation restored, his potions used under the full knowledge that he was the one who had created them, his brilliance as an experimenter and an innovator acknowledged…

It seemed to him that he would have little else to wish for.

But then he shook his head. Everything came with a price. Granger wasn't offering the gift out of the goodness of her heart. She would gain some fame from it too, some reputation for brilliance, as though she had interpreted his notes without any outside guidance. And there was the little fact that she wanted a reversal of the Vows that had cost Severus so much, that she wanted Potter free to trouble him again.

Severus grimaced and opened his eyes. If he accepted this bargain, there would have to be more to it, it would have to be _secured _by more than the naïve trust that Granger was displaying in thinking he would agree at once and believe in her to do everything correctly.

And that security would almost certainly have to come from Potter. There was something to be said, after all, for his inflexible rejection of the gifts that Draco and Severus had offered him. If he agreed to something, then Severus could trust him to hold to it, because he had no reason to give in for greater privileges or because he pitied them.

Severus stood. He had spent too long already today thinking about Potter, and he had promised himself that he would not. He went to his lab for a much-needed brewing session, his mind cleared and settled.

* * *

"Did you contact the vampires yet?"

"Um."

Draco stared at Potter. Potter was the one who had wanted to know whether he had contacted the werewolves the morning after it had happened, who had insisted that he discuss the unusual werewolf he had met with the centaurs, who had negotiated the tricky relationship between Kleianthe and Thera over their argument. And now he stared out the window of the library, his fingers rasping along the edge of the desk.

"Well?" Draco asked at last. "Did you?"

Potter blinked and turned back. "No," he said. "My friends visited yesterday, and I wasn't in the right mindset for it. I doubt the vampires would appreciate someone who's visibly distracted and interested in something other than talking to them."

Draco had to nod, but that didn't mean he had to sympathize. "Does little Potter miss his friends that much?" he cooed.

Something strong and dark moved through Potter's eyes, like a leviathan beneath the surface of the water. Draco licked his lips, enchanted by that glimpse of blackness in the green in a way he had never been before. _This _was the kind of response he had craved from Potter, helpless, infuriated, the way that Draco had been able to provoke him in school.

The next moment, it was locked away again, and Potter's fingers stopped trying to make new holes in the table. He leaned back in his chair, stared out the window, and said evenly, "No. Hermione thinks she might have come up with a way to free me from the Unbreakable Vows, and then I can finally leave here."

Draco stared again. Then he said, "And leave the alliance behind? Leave the centaurs behind, when Cadmaea and Starborn spoke to us this morning for the first time?"

Potter gave him a flat look. "As you've reminded me again and again, it's pure-bloods these alliances matter to. I'm not that. And you don't care about me being here one way or the other. In fact, sometimes I think you want me gone, because that means that you would have to think less about the way you act around Snape."

Draco shook his head. "The vampire situation should tell you that half-bloods are important, too."

Potter laughed. "You're licking your lips, did you know that? That _visibly _left a bad taste in your mouth." The flat look was back again a moment later, amusement banished as if it had never existed. "No. Ron said something yesterday which made a lot of sense. I'm always giving up what I want so that someone else can have it. I thought about staying for you and the Ashborn, trying to make Snape give up his control of you, but who the fuck am I kidding? He never will, not for any price. That's his security shield. Having me as a hostage isn't that important to him, though, so he'll trade for it."

"I don't want you to leave," Draco said.

Potter stared at him. Draco would have liked to step back and join him in staring at himself. Had he really said that? Had he really just sounded like a pleading little kid, when he once would have done anything to avoid that?

And in front of _Potter?_

"Well, uh." Potter's shock had cut beneath that glassy surface of annoyance and amusement, just like the anger of a moment ago had. Draco felt his stomach stir with a hunger that wouldn't manifest as anything like a growl. That was what he wanted, what he craved. Making someone else react to him, see him as a source of emotion, not just a convenience. Severus's jealousy had been wonderful, warming him more than the chocolate had, but he wanted Potter's anger, too.

The shock vanished, though. Potter settled himself neatly back into place and gave Draco a scornful glance. "That's too bad. I'll owl you, if you want, and you can tell me about the progress of the alliance and whether Snape ever lets you out to play on your own. But I'm not staying here."

He turned away, but not in time. Again Draco saw real emotion from him, shattered glass that flew and cut. Yearning for distant skies, longing to fly, longing to be with people who were not Draco.

That hurt, and it shouldn't, and it was stupid, Draco knew. But at least he knew Severus preferred the company of potions and automatons to Draco's because they gave him things Draco couldn't give him. He wasn't being set aside for other people, the way that Potter wanted to set him aside for his friends.

"It's more than that," he said. "We have your word of honor on the alliance, and the centaurs trust you. It can't succeed without you."

Potter gave an irritated twitch, as though Draco had reached over and flicked his ear. "That's another example of something I would make sacrifices for if I stayed," he said. "I was only doing this to stave off boredom. It isn't _real _for me."

Draco laughed before he knew he was going to do so. Again the dark shape was in Potter's eyes, and Draco felt a thrill as though someone had stroked his arm up and down with a warm cloth.

"I don't think you can lie very well," Draco told him. "Except by omission, maybe, and except to yourself. This was real. You just preferred to pretend it wasn't, because you don't want to think of yourself as less than a hero for abandoning us."

"I told you from the beginning it was about boredom." Potter had gone icy, and perhaps he thought he was magnificent, but Draco knew better. He was magnificent with rage or compassion burning from him. He was fire, not a glacier, and he should never try to be that way. "What else do you expect from me?"

"For you to acknowledge that anything you put effort into becomes real for you," Draco said. "The alliance. Freeing the Ashborn from the toils of mind control. Trying to rescue me from Severus, little as I needed the rescue."

"Now who's denying that something is real?" Potter leaned forwards, intent on driving the conversation, Draco knew, back on Draco himself. "You were a slave and half-alive, and you didn't _realize _it. You thought Snape had a right to treat you like that. You barely thought of yourself as a human being, did you?"

Draco started to snap back, and then paused. That wasn't an effective tactic, not with someone like this.

He bowed his head and stared at the table. "If you're right," he whispered, "how long do you think it will take after you leave before I tumble right back into the old habits?"

He could hear Potter's teeth grinding from across the table, and smirked at his hands. If the idiot thought that walking away and out of the alliance he had supposedly tried so hard to build should be easy, then he was a bloody hypocrite and deserved everything that Draco might want to hand him.

"You don't understand," Potter said at last.

Draco looked up and nodded. "I'm used to hearing that. It's the sort of line that Severus used to feed me all the time." He sighed and pushed back from the table. "Well. If you've made your decision, then I can't stop you, of course. I hope the centaurs continue to speak to me and don't lose faith because you walk away." He started to stand.

Potter circled around the table quickly enough to impress Draco; he decided to remember how rapidly the man could move. Draco found himself leaning against the wall with Potter's hands on his shoulders, although one looked as if it might move up to his throat. Draco breathed out and stared at him.

"You don't believe that," Potter said, and gave Draco a shake hard enough that it seemed as if it might jolt a tooth loose. "You don't believe _this_. You're playacting again, the way that you've always playacted for Snape. _Why_?"

"Because you're an idiot," Draco said, first making sure that he could breathe before he said the words. "You _know _that you're setting up the alliance for failure if you walk away. It's still tiny. We still barely have anyone in it. If you want to abandon it and go do something else, it'll fall apart. And that might not bother me, except that you're still arranging things so that you're the noble martyr, the one who would like to stay but has no choice." He reached up and put one hand on Potter's arm. "That's not how you teach me and Severus better, if you really want to," he breathed, staring into Potter's eyes.

* * *

_Damn it. I should never have started this conversation. I should have nodded and laughed along with him and left the possibility that I might walk away until I actually had proof that I might._

Harry wanted to hurt Draco, but that wouldn't solve any of the problems. He let Draco go and turned his back, running his hands through his hair.

"I know that I can't teach you better if you don't want to learn," he said, flinging the words like a handful of nails in Malfoy's direction. If they landed and pierced the vulnerable places on his body, so much the better. "It's just—that was arrogant of me, to think I could come in and change things. I shouldn't have. Is that what you want to hear? That I was wrong?"

"So close, and yet so far," Malfoy said, with a melodramatic sigh. "You did come in and change things. So put up with the consequences. Stand up and accept that you're abandoning something if you walk away. Did you notice that? That I leave the option open to you to leave? I just want you to acknowledge that it's abandonment."

Harry shook his head. He had to hold onto what Ron had told him yesterday. That he had always been too eager to give himself up for someone who wanted rescue, because he liked to see himself as doing good. Of course he had only entered the alliance and encouraged Malfoy to leave Snape to relieve his boredom, but he could have done other things, like plunging into the long-delayed study of wizarding history that Hermione kept encouraging him to make. It said something about him that he had decided Malfoy and the Ashborn had to be helped instead.

_Nothing complimentary about me at all, might I add._

"Fine," he said. "I'm abandoning you and the alliance is going to fail." His voice cracked in the middle. He swallowed. "You're probably going to become Snape's doll again in no time, without someone to stand up for you. Are you satisfied?"

"Hardly." Malfoy stepped around him and came to a halt in front of him. "But I reckon that it'll have to do for now."

Harry stared at him. Then understanding flashed in him, and he reached out and shoved Malfoy in the chest, hard enough to rock him back a few paces. "You _fucker_," he said. His voice was quieter than he had thought it would be, but Malfoy paled, so that was worth a few pains taken. "You were playing with me all the time. There was no—there was no _reason _to do that. You just wanted to see what I would do."

"How could that be, when I didn't know that you were thinking about leaving until just now?" Malfoy demanded, reaching out and catching his hand, then squeezing hard enough Harry winced. "No. What I meant is that I finally got a reaction from you. You sounded upset by having to leave me behind. I've wanted and struggled for something like that for ages now, and now I have it." He had an odd tone to his voice, smug and not, and his eyes darted down to Harry's and then away.

Harry turned and started knocking his head gently against the wall of the library. Malfoy seized him by the back of his neck. "Don't do that!" he said.

_Of course. If I splattered my brains all over the books, then he would be the one who had to explain things to Snape, and God forbid that _that _happens. _Harry turned around with a sigh. "Really, Malfoy? A reaction from me is worth that much?"

"Yes." Malfoy folded his arms. "You can talk about rescuing me from Snape and treating me like a real person all you like, but you weren't doing that, not really. What you did was different. You saw me as someone to rescue, and you did your duty. But you weren't focusing on _me_. You were focusing on the duty. Why are you angry about the Ashborn being enslaved?"

"Because it's wrong," Harry said, glad that he finally had a simple question to answer. Well, some of the others _should _have been simple, but because Malfoy was mad and demanded stupidly complicated responses, Harry was never going to arrive at the right one. "It's wrong for someone to set himself up as king of someone else's thoughts. Volde—sorry, Snake-Face would have done that if he had managed to take over the physical world, I can't imagine it wasn't stirring in that swamp-water mind of his—"

"And me?" Malfoy moved a step forwards. "When you began suspecting that I wasn't enslaved at all, just following Severus for different reasons, then why did you think you had to end that?"

"Because it's wrong, again," Harry said. "Even if you want to be his lover, he can respect you more than what he was doing—"

"But you didn't care about the particular circumstances that surrounded it," Malfoy said, his eyes gleaming now like the heads of nails. "Not about _me_, not about what I specifically would need. You just thought that talking to me about it and showing you could respect me was enough. That might be, with one of your friends. But they already know that you have an investment in them beyond some vague, abstract morality. _I _don't have that. If you want to rescue me, you'd bloody well better have a more important reason than because Snape is wrong or because you're right. Do you?"

Harry sighed and tugged at his hair. "I can understand why you want a friend," he said. "But I think I would be a horrible one for you, at least right now. I don't understand you, no. I don't know what you want—"

"Because you won't take the time to learn," Malfoy finished, nodding wisely. "You won't take the time to become part of the alliance, even as you scold me and Kleianthe for disrupting it. You won't listen to my reasons and accept that I might have the ability to trust and admire Severus and still recognize that I'm less than satisfied with him. You don't want to do anything more complicated than make the occasional moral pronouncement."

Harry shook his head. "Staying with you wouldn't change that."

"It might help," Malfoy said. "It might help if you stopped reacting to everything like some bloody wise and holier-than-thou _automaton_, and engaged with people instead of always doing the right thing."

"Abandoning you isn't the right thing," Harry said. He knew that he sounded desperate, but it was hard to care when Malfoy's words kept twisting his head in new directions. Directions he didn't want it twisted. If he waited, then he might lose track of the clear simplicity that his friends had planted in his head yesterday. "So you ought to want me to do it, because that would prove that I can make mistakes and I'm flawed."

Malfoy moved in again, and this time his arms were holding Harry against the bookshelves, and his eyes were so close that Harry looked away uncomfortably. He didn't think he'd been this near anyone since the day that he'd spent chained to a dead Death Eater and lying there with her face staring into his. He dreamed of that still, sometimes, and if Malfoy's eyes held more life and light, Harry didn't understand what was going on behind them any better.

"I know you're flawed," Malfoy breathed. "And I know that you're more than willing to admit that, because it doesn't go very deep. What I want to hear you say is that you'll do the hard thing and keep the Unbreakable Vows if it turns out that Severus doesn't want to let you go in exchange for the bargain your friends propose. I want you to argue with me and yell at me and tell me when I'm being stupid. I want you to discuss Quidditch with me like things are normal and have more planning meetings about the alliance. Don't think just about your friends and the life that you lost. Think about the present, the here and now."

"I don't _want _to." Harry shoved at Malfoy's shoulders, needing him to clear off and out of his face, but Malfoy only tightened his hands and stood there, so Harry reckoned that had been useless. "The life I have now is so bloody boring, and there'll never be any change in it and no friends and no companionship."

"There could be," Malfoy said stubbornly, "if you'd listen to the things that I'm telling you."

Harry rolled his eyes. "And what? You'll be my friend as long as we have the pure-blood alliance in common? You'll be my friend with all that hatred we have between us and the blood prejudice and God knows what else you still believe in? I don't understand you, I don't want to, and that's all the more reason that I'm looking forward to leaving this place." He shoved again at Malfoy's shoulders, and this time managed to move him away enough that he could get his own shoulders off the wall. He straightened his clothing and stared out the window, being careful not to catch Malfoy's eye again.

"You think we'll never be friends, then," Malfoy said, and Harry couldn't tell what he felt from the surface of his voice or its tone. "Just victim and hero, just rescued and savior."

"I don't know," Harry said. "I do know that I don't understand you, and it makes more sense to me when we're working on the goals of the alliance. I don't think even _you_ know what you want from me, and that just makes it impossible for _me _to."

"I'm learning," Malfoy said, and then changed subjects the way Harry had been wishing he would. "You're going after the vampires tonight? I hope that you'll be fucking careful. I still don't think that this immunity you're supposed to have with Legilimency will work when it comes to them."

"Then why not insist on taking up that duty yourself?" Harry snapped, still rattled. "If you think that you have the proper respect for their powers, and I don't, and if pure-bloods set up the alliance in the first place—"

"This matters more to me than it does to you," Malfoy cut in. "That means that I want this to succeed, and if the vampires had a quarrel with my ancestors that resulted in them being thrown out of the alliance, then it could be counterproductive for me to face them. I'm not trying to stop you going, am I?" He paused, then added softly, "Well, not trying to stop you from going _there_, at least."

Harry couldn't help it, although at the bottom of the heart he knew it was probably a stupid idea. He turned around and looked.

Malfoy looked back at him, eyes calm and steel-grey. Once again, Harry thought he could compare them to the heads of nails and not be far off.

Harry shook his head. He didn't know what words were going to come out of his mouth before he said them, which was disorienting, but at least that meant Malfoy looked as shaken as Harry felt when he spoke. "This is the reason we can't get along. You change from moment to moment, sometimes you're beaten-down and sometimes you're stronger, sometimes you're angry at me and threaten to kill me and sometimes you want my friendship. We could never be friends because I need to know what a person is _like_, and not just what mask they feel like putting on today."

A faint smile crooked Malfoy's mouth. "I didn't know who I was either, for a long time," he said simply. "I thought, after the war, I had to be Severus's lover and the preserver of the Malfoy legacy, since my parents were dead. Now I'm waking up, and I think it's like waking up a muscle that's been cramped by a long period of sitting. You don't learn everything that you can do with that muscle all at once. It takes a while."

Harry thought about it, then nodded seriously. "That's officially the weirdest comparison I've ever heard, Malfoy."

Malfoy shrugged and said, "Tell me about the precautions you're taking against the vampires. Since, after all, that's what we're here to talk about." He leaned back in his chair and stretched his legs out underneath the table.

Harry went cautiously back to tales of his plan, while he watched Malfoy out of the corner of his eye. But he didn't see any other changes that would have made him wary for the rest of the conversation.

Maybe Malfoy's analogy made more sense than he'd thought.

_And maybe it doesn't matter how much sense it makes, because I won't be here to see it. _

* * *

Severus knelt down and stared into the eyes of the automaton he had chosen to begin constructing. It stared back without intelligence, no surprise since he had not put any _life _behind those eyes yet. It was a cat, an elegant, small little beast patterned in silver and grey, with eyes that would be diamonds when Severus was done.

He was making it as another gift for Draco. After he cast the spells that made it move and, to a certain extent, think, he would never give it an order again. It would be Draco's entirely, a companion and a guard and a servant and anything else that he could think to make of it.

Severus had thought about assigning some of the Ashborn permanently to him, but Draco would know that Severus always controlled the bindings on their minds. Besides, many were Death Eaters who had laughed at Draco or tortured him when they were still free. Severus had not started crafting the automatons until after the war, and he had never made one as a gift for someone else. This was unique.

He hoped that Draco would value it as it deserved.

And if he did not…

Severus stood and reached out for the powdered diamonds that he would need for the next step. If he did not, then Severus still wanted to make it.


	13. Changing the Game

Thank you again for all the reviews!

_Chapter Thirteen—Changing the Game_

Harry went to visit the vampires that night.

He didn't know what he ought to visualize, and Malfoy seemed less help than normal, just shaking his head when Harry asked him. Very well, then, Harry thought, determined to keep calm even when Malfoy was being an idiot. He would reach out to the first image that came to him, and see how closely it corresponded to the dreams of any vampire out there.

If vampires dreamed. Harry wondered what would happen if he touched the mind of one who was simply awake. Would it feel him? Would it try to seduce him? Would it be able to control him or possess him that way, as both Malfoy and the centaurs seemed to fear?

Harry had to smile as he thought about that. The vampire might be sorry it had tried, given his fucked-up memories that rose the moment someone tried to touch his mind with Legilimency or anything like it.

He lay in his bed and gave himself long moments to let his eyes flutter open and shut, looking at his painted walls and then losing the images again as his eyelids came down. He let his mind drift. He had discovered that he was no good at meditation or Occlumency the hard way. He had to think of different things, creeping up carefully on the blankness that he wanted. Trying to force himself into an immediate blank, calm state was just asking for disaster.

"Potter."

The voice sighed through him from a distance, carrying notions of blood and iron. Harry's breath drifted out in response. Had he made contact with a vampire already, or was that Snape or Malfoy calling him?

His eyes fluttered open lazily, and he found himself lying in a crypt.

His first thought was, _Typical. _His second was that it probably didn't count as a crypt if the bodies in it were still moving around. He sat up and carefully considered the scene in front of him.

The walls were black stone, lit only by torches. Harry noticed that the torches burned with dim blue flame, and wondered if that meant they were using a fire that couldn't harm vampires. A salty stink seemed to confirm it. He'd never smelled that scent from any ordinary flame, no matter what it looked like.

The walls were carved with hollows and images of skulls and gravestones, but Harry couldn't see one actual skeleton. Instead, there was a black bench in front of him, made of ebony so polished that he could see his dim reflection moving in it. On the bench sat a single vampire, its legs folded, staring at Harry.

Harry nodded back. The vampire might have passed muster as human in the right light, but this close, Harry could make out the wax-tone to the skin and the way that its mouth was rearranged to accommodate the fangs. Its clothes were all black, too, and around its neck hung something on a thin silver chain. Harry thought it might have been a pendant, but the shiny back was turned towards him, and he wasn't sure.

"Hullo," Harry said.

The vampire blinked. At least he'd succeeded in surprising it. Him, Harry reckoned, once he heard the wheezy, deep voice the vampire summoned up to speak. "Why have you come here?"

"Because we're putting together an alliance, and they thought a half-blood would appeal more to you than a pure-blood," Harry said. Lying would only make the vampires feel slighted when they found out the truth, and they probably would. Harry didn't want to rely on the discretion of everyone in the alliance.

_Hell, I don't want to rely on the alliance at all._

The vampire rose to its feet and came slowly across the floor towards him. Harry took note of where he was—back to the black stone wall, seated on the floor as though someone had dumped him there—and got ready to move. He had no idea why he had landed that way, but then, this method of communicating with magical creatures through dreams still seemed suspect to him. He would be happier if he never had to do it again.

_I would be happier if I could simply go back to my normal life and not do something like this ever again._

Harry put on a harsh smile as the vampire rocked to a stop next to him. It didn't move quite like a human, Harry thought. The movements were heavier and less graceful than a human's most of the time, but faster and more liquid in the turns of the joints. When the vampire spoke this time, he could see the fangs, and they were more slender than he had been led to believe. He thought he could reach up and break one off with a push of his finger.

"They thought that I would favor a half-blood's taste over a pure-blood's?" The vampire laughed, and the sound came up from inside the chest with a hollow clang, as though it were a heartbeat. "How kind. But there is no link between taste and the ridiculous blood prejudice that your kind entertains."

Harry cocked his head. "I'm sure I would agree with you. But no, this isn't a gift for you on _that _score. What I am is an ambassador. And since the last alliance started crumbling when pure-bloods threw you out of it, maybe a half-blood would be more acceptable."

The vampire's hands had started towards his shoulders. They halted, in a way that Harry knew a human could never have mimicked. No matter how long he watched them, they never shook or trembled. The vampire either had perfect control over its body or less need for the kind of small movements that a human would always make.

"You do not know what you are saying," the vampire whispered.

"I know the history only a little," Harry admitted, drawing up his legs beneath him and clasping his arms around them. "So it could be that I'm mistaken. But I don't think so. What I just said meant something to you. What?"

The vampire turned its head from side to side, as if Harry's words would make more sense when his face was viewed from a different angle. Hell, it could. Harry didn't know much about vampires at all, only the common-sense things that everyone learned in Defense Against the Dark Arts, like the sensitivity to sunlight and so on. What if they could see words on the air, or hear their echoes longer than other people?

"You are an odd choice for an ally," the vampire said abruptly. "We know that you do no favor the Dark Arts or the Dark Lord."

"Was I mistaken, then?" Harry raised his eyebrows and rose to his feet. The vampire moved back so that he could. Harry hoped that was a good sign. On the other hand, he remained uncertain whether the vampire could break his neck in this dream-realm or not. "I thought that most of your kind didn't work for Voldemort, that it was just one or two loners. Were you his servants? Are you going to kill me for killing him?"

"We are servants to no one." The vampire bent towards him, and Harry could smell the breath it was using to speak. It had a dusty, airless quality, as if it had been shut up in a tomb for a long time. _Only appropriate, really, _Harry thought, struggling to hold his breath. "You will have to learn that if we are to be allies."

"Are we?" Harry cocked his head at the vampire. "Seems to me that we haven't agreed on that yet."

The vampire made another abrupt motion, as though it was going to pluck something out of his chest. Harry watched and felt his heartbeat speed up, his mouth fill with saliva, his eyes widen. He was alive in a way that he hadn't been in the past several months, it seemed. He had felt like this when he was challenging someone on a battlefield, or creeping through one of the traps and labyrinths that Voldemort seemed to favor to guard his Horcruxes. Never any other time.

_Will I feel this way if I get to go back to Ron and Hermione?_

It was a thought that he had to put aside for later, because the vampire's motion had stopped before it injured him, and now it moved back, saying in a polite tone, "We will need to speak with Lady Zembaz."

"Will we?" Harry took the chance to stand up, and shake his wand into a comfortable position for gripping. He could do a little with wandless magic, yes, but he wouldn't trust it to save his life if a more powerful vampire came on the scene. "Who is she?"

"Here."

Harry turned, starting to open his mouth and protest that he had asked _who _she was, not _where. _But then he saw the other vampire, and he had to swallow.

She had hooked claws on her hands, and pointed ears that nestled under curling horns atop her head, and glimmering black scales along her flanks and face. Harry wondered for a moment if he had found a nest of vampires ruled by something that wasn't one of them at all, but she turned to the side, and he could make out her fangs, still slender and needle-like, like the fangs of the first one. He nodded to her, and tried to see the humanity in her red eyes and thin, pinched face. It wasn't easy. The thick braids of snow-white hair bound around her horns made it a little better, though.

"Lady Zembaz," Harry said, and inclined his head. "My name is Harry Potter. I haven't heard of you before, though."

"Interesting, that you assume I _would _have heard of you." Zembaz moved closer. Gloves covered her hands, except the claws at the ends of her fingers, but Harry thought he could see nobbled and twisted shapes under them that indicated she didn't have normal fingers, either. "I had not heard you were that arrogant."

Harry shrugged. "You can be a little more arrogant when you've survived a war and you're negotiating for a pure-blood alliance. Oh, and you killed a Dark Lord, too. I think that's the part most people find impressive." He met her eyes. They weren't as bad as Voldemort's, but maybe that was because Voldemort had been his personal nightmare for so long. Or maybe she just wasn't using the mind-controlling magic that Malfoy had warned him about. _Be careful, Harry. _"Are you going to be the vampires' negotiator? Can you, when you don't look like the rest of them?"

"I am a vampire," said Zembaz, and a small smile lifted her lips. She didn't have other teeth, Harry noticed, or other fangs, but she did have a mouth filled with shining silver. Her gums seemed to have turned that color, and also got plated. "This is what we begin to change into when we are old enough." She nodded at the black bench the other vampire had been sitting on when Harry first appeared. "Won't you join me?"

Harry nodded and followed her, making sure that he took one end of the bench when she took the other. He would have expected the horns to overbalance her, they were so huge and curving, but she sat as if she was accustomed to the weight and spent a few minutes looking him over. Harry watched her claws and wondered if she had a wand.

"It is true that it was the pure-bloods who broke the alliance with us long ago," Zembaz continued, as if they'd been talking about that all the time. Maybe they had; it wouldn't have surprised Harry to learn that she could look through the eyes of the other vampires around her and listen through their ears, the way that Snape was doing with the Ashborn. "But sending a half-blood who has so little idea of or interaction with his pure-blood heritage sounds stubborn and willful to me."

Harry had to smile at that. He wondered for a moment what Snape would have said if he was in his place, and then rejected the thought impatiently. He and Malfoy were doing this because Snape was a pain in the arse and couldn't keep his boyfriend contented or support his hobbies in the first place. Thinking that he would ever be here, that he would _want _to do something like this, was silly. "Well, we are two teenagers and several centaurs so far, and that's all." He thought of mentioning that Draco had gone to the werewolves, and then decided that could wait. They didn't even know if the werewolves were going to agree yet, since Draco had tried to dream again and made no contact with them.

Zembaz tapped her claws together, which made a far more intimidating sound than fingernails would have. Once again, Harry knew where he should move if she did. But she hadn't seemed very hostile. Perhaps she wanted the alliance. "I do not know if I trust someone like you," she said. "I might prefer the pure-blood."

Harry nodded, not really surprised. Sending him had been worth a try, but what could his fame really mean to someone like Zembaz, who had probably seen half a hundred Dark Lords killed and their conquerors go on and die? "Okay. I can tell him that when I get back."

"Can you?" Zembaz leaned closer, and her eyes were so bright that Harry thought he could have seen them with his own closed. "No, I don't think that I want that. I think I want an explanation right now as to why the pure-blood wasn't sent."

"Because he thought you would take offense to him and try to drain him dry," Harry said. "Half-bloods didn't betray you personally, so you might like them a little better."

Zembaz sighed, and the sound had a cold edge to it that made Harry tense. But her words were mild. "Half-bloods are also held in contempt by pure-bloods. When you are as old as I am, you judge your honor not only by what people say and by your own standards, but by the standards of other cultures. I know what it means that they sent you."

Harry angrily met her eyes, his own guts churning. He was a half-blood, and that was all that _mattered, _wasn't it? Draco could prattle on all he liked about how Harry was part of the alliance and shouldn't walk away from them, but—

Zembaz smiled, and then her eyes were sliding into his like knives, and her mind was sliding into his like the cruelest knife.

Harry tried to fling a hand up over his eyes, tried to strengthen what weak Occlumency shields he might have, tried to ready his memories so that they would form a whirling wall between him and the vampire's will, and she sliced it all to pieces. She spoke softly in the depths of his mind, and her voice was sympathetic, even as she gripped and sifted all his memories and understood him in a moment, like someone understanding a cake by swallowing a large gulp of it.

_You fear me. You need not. I have nothing to give you that you will not like. You will have strength from me. Confidence. Power. You can go back to your pure-blood allies secure in the knowledge that you have more than any of them, now. It is not every pure-blood who carries a centuries-old vampire in his mind._

Harry scratched and bit and fought. Or he tried. After a few moments, he became aware that it was like the struggles of a kitten held in a giant's hand. Zembaz stroked his mind to stillness and went on looking, now and then making murmurs and chuckles of pleasure. But never surprise, never that. After she had lived so long—and Harry felt the centuries there suddenly, laid on his mind like a stone blanket—nothing that a mere human teenager did was going to surprise her.

Then she found one of his memories of the war, and it shredded the tendrils she had twisted through his mind in that direction. Harry felt her surprise then, wild and cold as a winter wind, and wished he hadn't.

_Oh, _she said. _You should not have, no. _And she gathered him up and punished him for that, claws trailing through his mind so often and so hard that he began to sob, and didn't care if someone heard it. He had overestimated his capacity, and he was going to die this way, with the vampire wearing him like a puppet—

_Potter! Harry!_

He thought that must be Zembaz for a moment, because he knew that he wasn't hearing it with his ears, and he couldn't imagine she would let anyone else in his head. But then he felt the faint sensation of hands shaking his shoulders, and remembered, with a leap of wild and glorious gladness, that this was a dream.

And one thing you could do with dreams was wake up from them.

So he lashed out, dragging himself up a sheer mountain and back to the surface of the dream, while Zembaz roared in his mind like a wakened dragon.

* * *

Draco didn't think he entirely knew what he was doing. On the other hand, if the alternative was to do nothing, that wasn't acceptable, either.

He had been shaken and jolted out of the meditative state he was using to try and reach the werewolves when someone began screaming. He had stepped out into the corridor and stared around, wondering why someone didn't do something, before he realized that the Ashborn couldn't act independently for a stimulus like this. An enemy would have had to swoop down with that scream on the fortress before they moved.

He grimaced and ran for Potter's room—because of course it was Potter who was in trouble like that, not Severus or the centaurs or one of the Ashborn—and found Bellatrix gone from the door. He couldn't think why. What mattered was that the door was charmed so it couldn't be locked from the inside, only the outside. It was a simple matter to kick it open and run in.

Potter was sitting on the bed, bolt upright against the pillows, as though someone had grabbed his shoulders and was holding him there. His eyes were _flipping_ up and down. It reminded Draco of the way that one of the house-elves had once accidentally enchanted the curtains at the Manor. He could see the whites and then the pupils of Potter's eyes, the darkness and then the light of them, and he shuddered.

But shuddering wasn't helping anyone. He leaped onto the bed and shook Potter hard, thinking he could at least unbalance him and make him fall over. That way, he might snap out of the trance or spell that gripped him.

Potter fell, but heavily, stiffly, as though his body was made of bones and wax. Draco stared into his eyes as they fell open again, and made out a swirling mass of red.

His first thought was the Dark Lord, since those eyes haunted his dreams, but he thought of the Dark Mark on his arm and the way it would be hurting if that were true, and he knew it had to be something different. Something else powerful, with red eyes, that could control Potter's mind and movements and make him react like this—

_Vampire. It has to be. _

Draco grabbed himself on the brink and leaped back, mentally and physically, from the plunge he had been about to take. He was good at Legilimency and Occlumency, yes, but that didn't mean he could survive looking a vampire in the eyes. He had been wary about Potter trying it, he remembered, but, well, the centaurs had wanted to send a half-blood to negotiate for the alliance, and Draco had foolishly agreed with them.

_And perhaps the most important thing at the moment is to rescue Potter from the consequences of that foolishness, not remind yourself that you knew what would happen all along._

Draco nodded several times, quickly, and then reached out and arranged Potter so that he was lying on the bed with his face aiming at the ceiling. Draco kept his eyes away from those red ones as he readied his wand. He had to admit that part of Potter's boast might have been right after all, if not the half that would have done him the most good. It seemed the vampire was having a lot of time breaking into Potter's mind, more than it should have done with someone as open as he was.

Draco knew the incantation he wanted, but it had been years since he learned it, and that meant he struggled in silence for long moments until the right words came back to him. "_Tintinnabulum corporis!_" he bellowed at last, and an almost delicate crystal flower opened from his wand and flared out to touch Potter.

Its effects weren't delicate. It made Potter's body ring like the bell the incantation invoked, and his head shook on his neck, and his heels flew up as though someone had snatched his legs into the air. A weak cry came from his mouth. Those red eyes flared once more into the normal green and white.

Draco repeated the incantation again, this time shouting Potter's name as he finished. The magic wound that into the chaos and drama occurring inside Potter's mind, snatching him steadily back towards the normal waking state he was supposed to be in; the spell was used to awaken people from trances, comas, and sleeping charms gone awry. Draco did it again, and added Potter's first name this time, so that both of them were sweeping and screaming through the interior of his hand like hawks on the wing.

Potter's head rolled to the side, and he moaned, an ordinary, human sound of confusion and pain.

"You're fucking all right, do you hear me?" Draco told me, and squeezed Potter's hand. The bones were vibrating under his skin, not an unexpected result with the Waking Bell. Draco held them until they stopped shaking and then recited the spell again.

This time, Potter's eyes flew open, and the tint of vampire red that had disfigured them a short time before was gone. He reached up and clasped at Draco's shoulders as if he were drowning, moaning again. Draco curled his arms around Potter and rolled over in the bed so that Potter could lie with his head and chest cradled against Draco's.

"We were," Potter said, and then forced his eyes shut as if he thought something else might look out of them. "Malfoy," he said, and his tone was breathless. "What are _you_ doing here?"

"Well, there's not many others who would come to your aid if they heard you screaming, are there?" Draco asked, and trailed his fingers down Potter's cheek. Potter jerked his head to the side and snapped his teeth on air. Draco rolled his eyes. "Now, Potter, is that nice? I'll have you know that I saved your life, and almost certainly your sanity, by casting that spell. It shook your mind out of the domination that the vampire must have been exercising over you."

"Zembaz," Potter said, and shuddered. "Yes. She was—she was a strange vampire, she had claws and horns, and she got me to look into her eyes and took over my mind without even any _effort._"

Draco froze, staring at Potter. Then he said, "She must have been wearing a disguise of some kind. A mask."

Potter had recovered enough by then to move away, leaving Draco with a faint regret for the loss of the warm weight in his arms. For once, he had felt as if _he _were the strong one, the one who had done something special and heroic, but of course Potter couldn't let that endure for long. He had to put distance between them, because God forbid that he rely on anyone but his friends. Draco sat on the resentment and hurt, because he wouldn't gain anything if he showed them now, and concentrated on Potter, and Potter's bright face, and Potter's disgusted gestures.

"Right, Malfoy, of _course_," he was saying, his voice so thick that Draco curled his lip. He really sounded as if he was about to spit up at any moment. "A mask, when the horns were growing from her _head_, and she had her hair pulled back to show these pointed ears, and I would have noticed if she was using a glamour." He didn't sound as though he were bragging, simply making a statement, as though his unusual magical sensitivity were nothing. "And she had the claws on her fingers. Believe me."

Draco swallowed. "Then, Potter, you can consider yourself lucky that you got away as fast as you did." _And with your mind intact, _he wanted to add, but didn't, because he didn't know how much of the credit belonged to Potter for having a strange mind and fast reflexes, and how much of the credit would belong to Draco himself. "Those changes indicate a vampire who's two thousand years old. Or more."

Potter froze for a moment, eyes wide, but the next second he shrugged. "Well. She seems to be our best chance to negotiate an alliance of some sort with them, then. But she was insulted that we sent a half-blood." He grimaced and rubbed a hand over his cheek. "So you should go next."

"Potter," Draco said, and decided to make his voice extremely slow and careful, so that Potter could understand all the implications of what Draco was saying instead of simply dismissing his claims. "You don't _understand. _She's a vampire you should never have been able to escape from in the first place. She's the sort of vampire that's not supposed to exist because the Ministry has special alarms that would alert their hunters of the need to destroy them before they _got _to that point."

"Well, the Ministry's been a bit disrupted in the past few years, hasn't it? So—"

"She didn't get to be two thousand years old or more in the last eighteen months, you _imbecile._"

Potter gave him a sharp look, and for a moment, Draco could see the leviathan beneath the surface of his eyes again. Then he turned his head away and shrugged with one shoulder. "Well. Anyway. Thanks for saving me. And maybe it would be best to wait to bring the vampires into the alliance after all, if they're going to have that kind of reaction to a half-blood ambassador." He started to roll off the bed.

Draco grabbed his arm and kept him still. Potter gave his arm a patient look, and then Draco an impatient one. Draco didn't care. This matter was bigger than Potter and his pathetic need to prove how strong he was. "She knows who you are now. She might try to take you over again when you sleep."

Potter's set jaw said he hadn't thought of that, but he simply nodded as though the news was something expected, rather than distressing. "Fine. Then I'll ask you to brew some Dreamless Sleep for me."

"I don't have the expertise to do that," Draco said, rolling over and hopping off the bed. He pulled Potter with him by main force. Potter had a scowl on his face, which seemed to indicate he thought Draco was lying just to fuck with him. Draco rolled his eyes. _As though I would take the time to do that. _"But Severus does."

Potter's eyes widened for a moment, and he stood still. Draco wondered whether he was actually showing more emotion, or he himself was just getting better at reading Potter. Then Potter shook his head. "He doesn't approve of us making the alliance in the first place. He won't help me. He has no reason to."

Draco sighed. "He wants to win my good opinion back, at least if all the little gifts he's giving me lately are any indication. And I want you helped." He tugged on Potter's arm again, but Potter had rooted his feet and was glaring at Draco.

"Why?"

"Why what? I don't know why he's changed his mind and is trying to court me with gifts now, but I think your presence might have something to do with it—"

"Why would you want to help me?" Potter narrowed his eyes. "You didn't want a vampire loose in the fortress, I understand that, but bringing me to Snape, drawing his attention to you when you have reason to fear that more than me because you've suffered more from him—"

Draco spoke before he thought. "Don't you owe me a life-debt, Potter? For saving you? Or at least a sanity-debt? It seems a small enough price to come with me and _shut up _about your fears that you're costing me something."

Potter stared at him for a second. Draco thought he saw something coming to life in his face that hadn't been there even when he was broken and helpless right after Draco cast the Waking Bell, and started to lean forwards—

In seconds, Potter's bloody blank mask had returned. He nodded. "Of course," he said. "Silly of me to forget it. Well. Let's go to Snape, then." And he turned around and marched out of the room as though this had been his own idea all along.

Draco followed, frowning. Of course his plan had been the best idea. A vampire of that age was an opponent even Severus would have trouble destroying. They couldn't risk themselves, or the alliance, or the Ashborn, on the chance that she would look through Potter's eyes or link to him through his dreams. And Potter's confidence that he could resist the vampire's mind-control had proven as foolish as every other claim he made.

Draco had done the right thing, the mature thing. And Potter had agreed with him, rather than fighting any longer.

So why did he feel as if he'd lost something?

* * *

Draco concluded the story he had told in an almost emotionless voice, and stepped back. That left Severus, who had seated himself halfway through the story, to look at Potter.

Potter gave him a single, uninterested glance, and returned his eyes to the surface of the lab table. His hands rested in his lap, folded in a serene position. He had dark circles under his eyes, but as far as Severus could remember, he had possessed those even as a first-year. He wasn't raving, wasn't shouting objections to anything Draco said, wasn't demanding that Severus give him poison before a potion.

He just sat there.

Severus was growing tired indeed of Potter the compliant hostage.

"I cannot know whether Dreamless Sleep, by itself, will be effective," he said, into the silence that Draco's words had left. "A vampire of such power could exploit a link to her victim's mind that did not come through dreams, but came simply from close familiarity with his thoughts. And a touch is all it might take to gain such familiarity. Potter, will you permit me to look into your mind? I can see if her image, for a lack of a better word, still waits there and provides her with a link."

Potter stirred for the first time. "You know what's happened the last two times you tried to look into my mind, Snape," he said. His voice was so quiet that Severus had to watch his lips to catch all the words. "The same thing will happen again. It's nothing I do on purpose, but no one who's _human _can use Legilimency on me."

"Well, someone managed, didn't she?" Draco snapped from behind Potter's chair, which at least let Severus know he was not alone in his unusual frustration with Potter. "If she did, then you should be able to lower the barriers for Severus."

Potter's eyes flashed, and his cheeks shone with a fire that Severus didn't think he'd seen since the boy came here, but his voice remained quiet, so quiet. "She did, and it _hurt_, you wanker. I can't lower the barriers for him because I can't _raise_ them, either. They're just there, and no one can get through."

Severus held back the immediate response he wanted to make. That would only alienate Potter further, and, for the first time since Severus had raised the barrier of the Ashborn, stand a chance of exposing them to danger that he could not fight against. He waited until Potter's gaze rested more squarely on him than on the middle distance, and said, "There is something we could try. If you take a Calming Draught before I attempt to enter your mind, then that might persuade the barriers to lower. After all, they are fueled by your own defensive needs and emotions. Artificial trust might therefore change them."

Potter gave him a grim, wolf-like smile. "I'll do it, sir," he said. "On one condition."

Though Draco shifted behind Potter's chair and sucked in a breath, Severus ignored that. He held Potter's eyes and nodded instead, and sure enough, Potter gave his surprise away with a brief stiffening of his neck and hands before he continued. "I want you to know. Use the memories against me, and I'll find a way to make your life a misery. And never mind the Vows you had me swear."

Again, the words surged up Severus's throat like boiling oil, and again he held them down. There was something more here than his anger and Potter's response, because his anger should never have existed in the first place. If he had been, in truth, as settled and calm, and with as little to wish for, as he had thought he was before Potter entered the Ashborn, then he would have responded with weariness or amused tolerance.

He would not have been _interested _in Potter, in obtaining some response but defiance from him. He would not have feared any influence that Potter might hold over Draco, knowing as he did that Draco would owe allegiance to him and him only. He would not have attempted to offer the boy gifts, or, if it had become necessary, he would not have cared when Potter refused them like the stubborn brat he was.

To gain something, one must give something. And though Severus did not yet know why Potter had cracked his supposedly glacial calm like a boulder thrown through the surface of a frozen pond, he knew it had happened.

"I understand," he said. "You need not fear that I will use the memories against you. Draco is the only one here who would appreciate my attempts to do so, in any case." He looked at Draco. "And perhaps not all of them."

Draco raised his eyebrows back, and then turned pointedly towards Potter, who had several small twitches near his eyes that might have been signs of uneasiness. He shook his head when he saw them looking and lifted his chin. "All right, so you have me. What are you going to do besides the Calming Draught?"

"Put you into an atmosphere that might also tranquilize you," Severus said, keeping his movements flowing as he stood up and considered Potter from a few different angles. "This lab must remind you of the Potions classroom at Hogwarts, which can hardly be a good memory."

Potter's hands spasmed once in his lap, before he clenched them down and stilled. Severus raised an eyebrow. _Is he angry that I noticed, or only surprised? _

"All right," Potter said. "There's got to be a place like that somewhere in this ruddy fortress, doesn't there? All right."

"I am overjoyed by your permission, Potter," Severus said dryly, and turned away to find a Calming Draught among the potions that crowded his shelves. "Do you wish Draco to remain?"

He saw Draco straighten from the corner of his eye, and knew he would resent, vocally, any attempt to send him away. Severus cast him a quelling glance, trying to tell him without words that the danger to the Ashborn was worth more than his pride, and saw Draco open, then close, his mouth. He nodded. Severus smiled and turned about with the Calming Draught, extending the vial to Potter.

"He can stay, I reckon," Potter said. He didn't take the potion yet, looking up at Severus as though calculating the best way to hit him in the throat. "What kind of place are you going to put me in?"

"Trusting, are you not?" Severus murmured, and shook his head when Potter continued to glare at him. "That is up to you. Would you prefer your rooms?"

Potter's jaw clenched harder than ever, the teeth grinding together audibly. Watching him, Severus would have guessed that he was caught between a desire to be in the place in the fortress that he found most comfortable and a reluctance to let Severus and Draco invade—the place in the fortress where he felt most comfortable.

In the end, he swallowed, loudly, and inclined his head. "That will be fine." He stood, his hand locked on the vial as if he would much prefer to drop it.

Severus caught Draco's eye, and saw that he was smiling as he watched Potter. Severus nodded. He could understand the impulse, at least as long as Potter was doing what he was told.

* * *

_This is mad. That's the only explanation. I went mad because they poisoned my food with something to make me do it, and that's the reason I'm going to swallow a potion that Snape's brewed and then let him into my head._

But Harry could remember the way that Zembaz's claws had felt like as they dug into his mind, and he could remember the way Malfoy's voice had sounded, shouting his name. He grimaced as he marched along the corridor in resigned silence, Snape and Malfoy so close behind him that he could feel their breath on the back of his neck.

_Not one of my favorite sensations, that._

Malfoy had saved him. For that, Harry would go along with this charade—up to a point. If Snape tried the Imperius Curse on him or planting memories in his mind to make him do something, the way he had heard that a skilled Legilimens could during the war, he would fight back so hard that he thought he could probably bring the walls down before the Unbreakable Vow kicked in and killed him.

It was weird, sometimes, he thought as he stepped into the room and took a seat on his bed while Malfoy conjured a chair and Snape sat on the one that was already there, how little he was afraid of dying. By Unbreakable Vow or choking, the way he almost had when the Death Eaters got hold of him, or because his mind was scooped out by an unspeakably powerful vampire, it was all the same to _him_. The people who might get hurt by his various ways of dying were the innocent victims he was concerned with.

_Well, in this case I doubt Ron and Hermione will like it if you die with Snape's claws in your mind. So swallow the Calming Draught already._

Harry grimaced and did so. He had always hated the taste of most potions, but he'd especially come to hate the taste of this one in the last few years, after the time Bellatrix had captured him and fed one to him mixed with something else. It had made him want to tear his skin off, and he'd almost done so before Voldemort burned the potion out of him and moved on to the next torture he wanted to inflict on Harry.

_And Snape is going to see all of that. _

Harry snorted and lay back, closing his eyes. He hated the way that his muscles went limp and some of his thoughts retreated to the back of his mind, how his anger and his desire to fight back blurred. Well. Much good that lot of memories would do Snape. He had been there for some of those tortures, or would have heard about them from his "friends," and in other cases, Harry had already dealt with the scars and moved on. There were very few ways that Snape could hurt him.

His breathing seemed to catch on an invisible snag, as his body remembered the spiked Calming Draught and sought to expel this one. Harry tilted his head back and breathed normally a few more times, winning free of the bloody memory.

Then he looked at Snape and nodded. He'd caught the man's mouth open, and he was _sure _that Snape had been about to make some crack about how Legilimency needed direct eye contact. "I'm here, sir," he said. "Do your worst."

Snape half-shook his head, his face calmer than Harry had ever seen it. If someone had asked him, he would have said that it was the face Snape probably wore when he was brewing potions. Luckily, no one _had _asked Harry, and he could shudder at himself for having to think about that, in silence. "You are not yet relaxed. Concentrate on something that will relax you, so that the barriers may come down."

Harry wanted to say that nothing was going to help with that, but he closed his eyes and focused on the moment right after he had killed Voldemort. He knelt in the middle of black dust, with crumbled stone and burned earth falling to pieces around him, and stared at the melted, slagged remains of his greatest enemy's body. He _breathed, _and from the presence of the air in his lungs and the blood flowing through his veins, he knew that he was alive.

He had won.

Harry held onto the image until he was sure that he could have recreated it on the walls using the spell Hermione had taught him to paint, if someone had asked him. Then he opened his eyes and nodded.

Snape leaned closer, and closer. Harry held back a private wince. Having the man this close threatened to destroy the comfort he'd found. Snape had never been someone who promoted calmness in him.

But he held onto the memory by sheer force of will—clinging to the locket Horcrux while he fell through the air was harder—and then Snape was taking his chin in a surprisingly gentle hand and turning his head up further, to face the light. His wand flicked along the side of Harry's cheek, close enough that Harry could see it and its motion wouldn't come as a surprise, down far enough that the casting wouldn't look aggressive.

"_Legilimens_," Snape whispered.

Harry heard Malfoy's erratic shifting about, and Snape's breathing, and the hesitant chirping of insects that had followed his defeat of Voldemort. He heard the sheets crinkle as Snape bent closer, and the way his pulse sped up as he looked into Harry's eyes, and the sound of Hermione crying when the message came from the Ashborn about wanting to take him hostage. He widened his eyes, refusing to blink, trying to let Snape in as he hadn't ever let anyone in.

There was a pause, and then Snape slipped through the barriers and into his mind.


	14. Before the Screaming Hordes

Thank you again for all the reviews!

_Chapter Fourteen—Before the Screaming Hordes_

Severus plunged in, and in, and down.

The images that streamed past him were, for the most part, the ones he had expected. Images of Potter running through Hogwarts at night, glancing over his shoulder to see if anyone had noticed him under that infernal Invisibility Cloak. Potter and his friends crouching over books and arguing about them. Potter and his girlfriend, the red-haired Weasley sister, holding hands and swearing eternal love. Potter standing in front of the Dark Lord with an expression that mingled defiance and despair.

That was all common enough.

But then Severus turned and plunged further under the surface, and met the other, streaming memories that arose like whales from the deep and swam towards him, and he saw why Potter's mind might have changed so as to make normal Legilimency impossible.

There were images of blood and torture there. Potter holding the Lestranges under the Cruciatus Curse, his face bearing no expression at all. Weasley retching out his stomach and bowels due to some poisonous potion, while Potter stayed beside him to embrace him and clean up his mess and in general display literally disgusting Gryffindor nobility.

Potter tied down while the Dark Lord bent over him and whispered filthy things in his ear, things that Severus was astonished Potter had remembered instead of taking the time and trouble to repress.

A labyrinth, dozens and dozens of stony passages cut through an underground cave, through which Potter and Granger ran with a shimmering locket in their hands and a screaming, howling beast on their trail. Potter's mind had not preserved an image of their beast, which was fine, as far as Severus was concerned. He knew the various candidates for something that might make that noise, and that Potter had challenged one of them and survived was the surprise here, not that he didn't remember it.

Potter ducking under a waterfall of blood and kneeling down in a pile of bones, sorting through them so that he could find the right skull and hold it on his knees. Severus would not have been surprised to see the skull's eyes glow as Potter asked something trapped inside it questions, but instead Potter picked up a stone and used it to smash the skull to small pieces, which he then picked up and began to eat.

There was Granger, her hair filthy and matted with blood and sweat, Potter beside her, crawling through something it took Severus some time to recognize. They were in the belly of a dragon; it had swallowed them without digesting them. Of course, that meant Potter and Granger—and Weasley, because there he was, behind them—had to dodge the acid that poured down around them and drag themselves through the fetid swamp of the food fragments that the dragon _had _digested. Flicking after that memory, as though pulled along with it, in its train, came the sensation of a shower that Potter had stood in for hours, long after the water had become cold, and scrubbed at the dried blood on his skin.

Severus shrugged. So far, he had seen no trace of the vampire's presence, and no reason for Potter to feel so awfully about what had happened to him during the war. Memories like these could not have raised the barriers that would keep a Legilimens of Severus's caliber out of a boy's mind. So he pushed, harder, trying to get under the surface and see what was there that was so molten with evil.

For a moment, Potter resisted. Severus could feel him rising up against the Calming Draught in a way that should have been impossible, stretching and struggling and straining. Of course, Severus did not know when the last time had been that the usual rules applied to Potter. He kept a mental sneer locked in place and pushed again.

He thought he might have met the vampire's power after all when the currents of Potter's mind bore him against something incredibly hard, enough to make the shock of pain shudder back into his own body, and not simply the mental projection of himself that he had placed in Potter's mind. Then he looked up and saw the visual of stone gates in front of him, hinged with silver. Around the hinges leaked mist that probably formed the memories and thus the barriers. But the real memories lay hidden behind them. Severus reached out and put a hand on the gates, though he had no reason to think they would open for him, specifically.

Perhaps Potter was trying to be cooperative in the way that Severus had accused him of deliberately not being. Perhaps he had realized that Severus was trying to help him. Perhaps he was simply too tired to fight anymore.

The gates quivered. Then they opened. Severus stepped through them and into the land of blood and ash.

The landscape around him was grey and red, and nothing else. Severus reached out to plunge his hand into a memory, and found himself drawn in more quickly than he would have been even by ordinary Legilimency.

He was in a dark place. He tried to move, and found that he couldn't. When he lay still and tried to listen to the input of his body, of Potter's body, he found the cause. Stones pinned him down from above, and his legs were broken, besides. That sharp pain could mean nothing else.

Potter's panting was loud in the confined space. Severus did not see why, unless the boy had claustrophobia. He himself had the presence of mind to look about and see what he could, but then again, unless what he wanted to see was darkness, there was nothing to find purchase or hold on. Nor was there anything to hear except the breaths, and perhaps the wild beating of his heart when Severus truly concentrated.

Then he heard a scrape in front of him.

The darkness seemed to lighten. At first, Severus thought the boy had found the strength to cast _Lumos. _But no, his wand hand was pinned, as Severus found when he tried instinctively to move it. The light came from the creatures in front of him.

They resembled worms with a multitude of small legs all the way around the edges of their bodies, fringed and feathered. Severus did not recognize them, but he would have liked to try them as substitutes for centipedes in a few of his potions.

For a moment, Severus thought they would try to eat the boy. But instead, they crawled down around Potter's hands and arms and crouched there. Some were moving over his legs, if the feeling Severus had from that direction was any indication. He blinked, and again thought that this memory was a poor one to inspire all that savage terror and anger in Potter.

The creatures continued to flow in. More and more of them, and they did not bite or scratch. They simply settled around Potter, rings around his arms, burdens on his shoulders. The boy was so trapped by the stones that he could not move in any case, and this was not a great addition to the pain.

Then the insects began to crawl into the small space between Potter's head and the stone in front of him. Their bodies brushed against Severus's face, against Potter's face, pushing into his nostrils and against his lips. Blocking his eyes.

Stifling his breath.

Potter began to scream, whimpering, wailing sobs of the kind that Severus imagined might come from a child who knew that it was abandoned and its parents would never come for it again. The noises cut at his nerves as the realization about the creatures themselves could not have done. He tried to tug himself out of the memory, but he had come in too deeply, and this was a powerful set of sensations. He was caught.

Potter's sounds became muffled as the creatures piled up, one atop another, feelers waving. He closed his eyes, but there were smaller versions of the worms that began to press under the edges of his eyelids, under the lashes, against the ball. Severus heard a distant sound of grinding stones that he suspected was a rescuer coming to Potter's aid—how had he survived this, otherwise?—but the feelings around him were too overwhelming to focus on it.

Potter's panic lashed him, and his own determination not to remain here and suffer it any longer. He finally, _finally _managed to pull himself free, and floated in the black space behind the gates again, staring at the floating pools of reminiscence.

Perhaps, after all, he did not disdain Potter for wanting to lock these particular denizens of his mind and nightmares up.

He drifted further, to the side, and found another pulsing light that he ventured to touch. This time, he deliberately kept part of his consciousness back, in the land of red and grey, so that he could escape again more easily.

He wondered if he should have when he found himself in a small, neat corridor in a Muggle house. Clearly this was a memory of Potter's childhood, and he had confined it here because he could not bear to remember the time when he had first realized that his uncle and aunt were not his parents.

Severus drifted across the corridor like a shadow and into a small place under the stairs. Potter was curled up in it, his breath rasping. Severus nodded. Ah. Undoubtedly where his claustrophobia came from. Potter had probably locked himself in here playing some childish game, and of course the fear would be the worst thing in the world for a boy who fancied himself brave.

Then he got closer, his consciousness more nearly blending with Potter's, and paused. The smells were strong now, the waste and the vomit. Had Potter been locked here when he was sick? That might explain the intensity of the memory, and of course Severus know all too well how being six or seven could exaggerate every sensation until it burned with a clear flame that adulthood could never match.

His friendship with Lily was an example of that. No doubt, if he had met her at Hogwarts, he never would have conceived of such a friendship, and could have remained above that.

He came closer, and found Potter lying on his side, his arms wrapped around his head, his body wracked with shudders and sobs. Close beside him was a bucket, and a small bed. Severus peered at the bucket and recoiled. It was full of feces, and their stink permeated the hot and stale air in the cupboard space.

Potter rolled his head to the side, his glazed eyes staring at Severus. His mouth opened, and he began to vomit, spreading a puddle of it that covered the floor. Severus was not sure whether he was sick or was responding to the smell of the feces, which he could not escape.

Severus began to release his hold on the memory again, enough that he left the cupboard and could look at its door. Locked shut. A Muggle boy passed by as he watched and kicked the door beneath the lock, so casually as to make it clear that he did it every day. "Mummy, the freak's throwing up again!" he shouted over his shoulder.

There was a long-suffering sigh that could only be Petunia's, and she stepped out of what looked like the doorway of a kitchen and banged on the door. "Be quiet in there," she snapped. "You know that we don't have the time to take care of you, and you shouldn't have been sick if you wanted attention." She turned away and went back to her work with an expression on her face as though someone had asked some enormous favor of her that she had at last fulfilled.

Severus shut his eyes again. He opened them. But the cupboard with the locked door was still there, and the retching sounds of the boy from behind it, lying sick and weak in his own filth.

He released his hold on that memory and darted silently back towards the surface, away from the gates. He spun tendrils around him as he went, fine filaments of power that would seek out the tenor of an alien mind imprinted on Potter's. Now that he had experienced some of the boy's most powerful memories, his secret shames, he thought he could identify that mind fairly easily.

Nothing answered him. Potter's mind was clear of any trace of vampires.

Severus went on rising, and opened his eyes, and leaned away from Potter. He kept his hand in place on Potter's chin, holding his face turned up to the ceiling, and did not look away even when Potter's eyes fluttered and opened.

He had received some answers, but, in the manner of all more complicated answers, they simply created even more questions.

* * *

Harry felt as though someone had taken a scalpel to his mind and scraped away any trace of dignity. He knew what Snape had seen, he knew that Snape knew about the Dursleys, and he wanted to vomit. Snape knowing about the war was one thing, because Harry had survived all those tortures and still killed Voldemort. But the Dursleys were his past, not part of the suffering that had made him motivated enough to take down Voldemort, and Snape would say things that…

Harry shuddered, and then coiled his anger and fear into a whip and tucked it away in some obscure corner of himself, where no one could find it. Yes, Snape might say something like that. It didn't _matter_. Harry was being an idiot to think it did. He had survived snakes spitting poison into his eyes and Bellatrix whispering and chuckling into his ear about Sirius as she tortured him and a Death Eater whose name he didn't know walking down his spine and breaking it into separate chunks, only to put it back together and start all over again. Compared to that, what were a few stinging insults? He could do this.

He was no longer afraid of death. That meant not being afraid of the things that seemed worse than death, either. Because he knew they really weren't.

He opened his eyes.

Snape still sat on the bed, and he kept hold of Harry's face as though he assumed that he needed the hold to control him or keep him down or something. His eyes were huge, and Harry couldn't read the emotions in them. Then again, he never had, at least not in such a way that Snape's reasons made sense to him. Harry knocked Snape's hand away roughly and sat up, turning to Malfoy, who leaned close in the chair.

"I didn't feel any trace of vampires," Harry said calmly. "And I think Snape probably would have told you if he found any. Right?"

Malfoy nodded, although his eyes were wide in much the same way as Snape's. Harry frowned, wondering if it was possible to ride along on Legilimency and pick up images from someone's mind even if it wasn't you reading that mind. Perhaps Malfoy had cast some spell that Harry didn't hear, because he was too busy drowning in the Calming Draught and trying to think calming thoughts to lower the barriers…

No. He wouldn't think that. He would take the words they gave him, and nothing else. And at the moment, that probably meant crushing insults. He turned back to Snape. "Well?" he asked, lifting his chin.

"Well, what?" Snape sat back and looked at Harry as if he was of no more interest than one of the fringed-with-feet insects that had nearly killed Harry. Harry shuddered and banished that memory to the back of his mind. He swallowed. He wondered if he had imagined some of the more extreme consequences, and if this meant that Snape was going to let everything go, in the interests of not connecting himself any more intimately to Harry than he had to.

But then he realized something else. Snape was _still sitting on his bed. _He hadn't backed away and gone to wash his mind free of the taint of stupidity he must have found in Harry's, the way Harry had imagined he would.

"You found no trace of the vampire," Harry said. "Did you?"

Snape shook his head. Harry relaxed. Until that point, he had been half-sure that Zembaz was somewhere lurking in the back of his mind after all, but if Snape said that she wasn't, he could relax and sleep tonight.

_If Snape says that she wasn't, you're willing to trust him? How the fuck does _that _work? _

Harry bit his lip, harshly, and shook his head. He didn't _know _how it worked, but the fact was that he would trust Snape on matters related to the mind, if nothing else. He just would, and give up wondering how it worked. Because to spend too much time thinking about that was to go mad, really.

"Great," he said. "Thanks. You can go away. I think I'd like to sleep now." Distance from Snape and sleep should both help to erase that horrible _stretched _feeling from his mind.

He started to lie down, but Snape reached out and put a hand on his shoulder, restraining him. Harry stared at him suspiciously. Snape's face was blank, but that didn't help. Once again, Harry was reminded forcibly that he had never really been able to read Snape.

"Did you think of something else you need?" Harry let the sarcasm bubble to the surface of his voice. The more he could annoy Snape, the more likely the man was to leave him alone. "Perhaps your own nightmares need refreshing?"

"I did indeed see images in your mind that were worse than what I had expected there," Snape said, bending near. Harry thought he could feel a faint echo of the fascination he must carry for Malfoy when Snape did that. Someone who didn't tell you outright what he thought, but just loomed and scowled, could seem more intimidating than some of the Death Eaters Harry had known, and that might be just the kind of person that you wanted to _protect _you from Death Eaters. "Particularly those images that came from your childhood with the Muggles."

Well. So here it was. Harry ignored the way that Malfoy's jaw was dropping, ignored the way that Malfoy snapped his head back and forth between them as though he hadn't suspected any such thing. Well, perhaps that meant that Snape hadn't told Malfoy anything while Harry was unconscious and unable to hear his voice. That was something, Harry reckoned, though not the uninterrupted silence about the Dursleys that he would have preferred to have preserved.

But sometimes he didn't get what he wanted. Harry met Snape's eyes and said blandly, "Yes, horrible, weren't they? But they're rubbish that I left behind. I'll never have to see them again, and that's good enough for me."

Snape was leaning in close again. Harry wondered how he _could _come closer without kissing. That was more in Malfoy's department, not Harry's, wasn't it? Harry had to bite his lip then to stifle an inappropriate laugh, and try to sit up and look calm and manly. He had the feeling it didn't work, if the way that Snape's eyes cut at him was any indication. "You will admit to nothing more than that?" Snape asked.

Harry snorted, and was glad that he could make it sound natural. Inside, part of him was ripping into shreds, the part that had sworn to defend his secrets and die before anyone else got hold of them, but as he had learned before, when it came down to it, he could bear quite a lot without dying. "Admit? Am I confessing a crime now? Or is this only part of your general idea that I should always be confessing some crime, or I'm not the Potter you know and love?"

Snape's hand cramped. Harry watched it._ Yeah. Stay closer and pursue this, and you'd better believe that I'll make you regret it as much as I can, Snape. Your choice. Is it really worth it? _

* * *

Draco didn't know all the details of what Severus had seen in Potter's mind, but he didn't need to. Not when Severus had that look in his eyes Draco recognized, although he had seen it only once. The look was the sharp, half-outraged one of someone who had clashed with his own preconceptions and come out the worse.

Draco had seen it before when the Dark Lord dropped his parents' mangled corpses in front of him. Severus was the one who had told him they would be safe, that the Dark Lord was too short on followers to waste them. He had stared at the bodies longer than Draco had, longer than Draco _could _have without giving in to the impulse to turn his head away and hide his face against Severus's robes.

What was there in Potter to stand up to the sight of Narcissa and Lucius Malfoy lying on the floor?

Draco half-hoped that he wouldn't have to find out, though from the way that Potter and Severus stared at each other, he wouldn't get that wish. For the moment, though, neither was moving, Potter secure in his defiance, Severus clearly considering which was the best way to proceed and not liking any of his options.

He cleared his throat.

Severus turned and stared at him in a way that would have made Draco cower a week ago. But Potter had come in to rescue him since then, and had taught Draco a little about how weak he must have seemed, how cowardly it was to take pride in his lover's sternness and strength but fear them at the same time. He matched Severus stare for stare, and at last Severus nodded and said, "You had something to say, Draco."

_He could have made it a question, but perhaps it's better he didn't. _"Yes," Draco said, glancing at Potter. "Did you see something in his mind that means he's a danger to us? Is he going to go mad in the night and kill us all?"

"I found no trace of the vampire, as I said," Severus said, and now his voice was tight and cold because someone had dared to contradict him.

"I didn't mean _that_," Draco said. "It's _Potter. _There's no saying that he won't go mad and murder all of us in our beds just because. Vampire in his head or not."

Potter bowed his head to Draco, and there was a glint in his eyes that made Draco feel as if he could fly. The git still didn't say anything, but then, Severus had almost forgotten Potter. He was staring at Draco, and he blinked more than that before he said, "No. I saw nothing to indicate that he would do such a thing."

Draco nodded. "Then does it _matter _what you saw in his head? Why not let it go, and come back some other time? If it matters," he added, and glanced at Potter, half-expecting the git would be insulted that Draco didn't think much of his rubbish bin of a brain.

But Potter smiled and nodded, and Draco realized abruptly that he was giving permission for Potter to go off and rebuild the barriers that kept his emotions locked up. Right now, he was more vulnerable than he had been since he came to the Ashborn, but he could regroup, if given enough time to recover. And he would.

Draco chewed his lip, trying to decide whether he wanted Potter alive with fire, reacting to him, or Potter free from this embarrassing tangle that they appeared caught in. What way would be best for Potter, and what would be best for the alliance, and what would be best for Draco himself? His life had certainly become more complicated once Potter induced him to start thinking about other things than Severus.

"It matters," Severus said, and with a heaviness in his voice that Draco had not expected, "because it was what had kept me out of his head the times I tried to read his mind. The boy was quite right. The twisted memories of the war were the main causes of those barriers, but there is also his childhood that needs addressing. There are problems caused by the way he conducts himself among the Ashborn that we can solve if we confront those memories."

Potter's eyes had darkened, Draco saw when he glanced at him. He was leaning forwards in his bed, and he had clenched one hand into a fist and driven it into the side of his knee. He looked as if he'd like to spring forwards and strangle Severus. Draco replayed Severus's words over in his head, and winced. _He _knew that this was about as kind as Severus ever got, but of course he couldn't expect Potter to know that.

_Funny that I'm taking Potter's side with sympathy, when five days ago I would still have been thinking about Severus first, _he decided in wonder.

"_So _sorry that you can't read my mind the way you went to," Potter hissed. "_So _sorry that you can't easily make a mindless slave out of me, the way you're trying to do with everyone in the Ashborn. If you think that means I'm going to give in and be your pet, your toy, your _tool_ like all of them, now that you've seen inside the confines of my skull, you can think again." His voice deepened, and Draco felt the words hammered out on the air, as if Potter was taking a fourth Unbreakable Vow. "Before I surrender to you and let you control me, I'll commit suicide in a way that destroys the peace and destroys the Ashborn. I promise, you try to force me to work for you and I'll destroy all your work. All your labor. I _promise._"

In the silence that followed the words, Draco licked his lips and thought, a little dazed, _Well, we got him to react, at least._

* * *

Severus held Potter's eyes, and did not look away. He was not using Legilimency to read Potter's thoughts any longer, but then, he hardly needed to. He had never seen such magnificent fury, and since Potter came here, he had never seen him so open. His emotions were all drifting on the surface of his eyes, ripe for the taking.

And Severus—he wanted to go on observing them. He didn't want to lock Potter's mind away as he had with the other Ashborn. He did not want to wield the dominion of fear over him the way he had over Draco.

Because it had taken Potter's coming to teach him how _bored _he was with that.

That was the reason his own emotions were so easily stirred, so present to be kicked up instead of decently locked away. He had achieved a life without challenges, only to learn that a life without challenges was a life without ambition, a life without goals. The nature of the obstacles he had faced so far—war, spying, two masters, losing his best friend because of his own stupidity—had tried him so severely that he had _thought _he wanted a life of peace. But he had had nearly two years to recover from his exhaustion with challenges, and to discover that he wanted to taste more of them.

Potter would give him that life of challenges.

In return, of course, for a life of almost constant irritation.

But, having seen the alternative, Severus thought he might be prepared to accept the price.

He laid his hands on the bed again and braced himself over Potter. Potter did nothing but glare back, _alive _with defiance, as if it was a smoke that he exuded, the air that he breathed. Severus felt his mind spin into sharper being with it, and he nodded a little. He would gain nothing if he tried to lie now, and not least because neither Potter nor Draco would believe him. What he _could _do was tell the truth and persist in what he wanted to do despite any disbelief, because that honesty was his strength. Potter and Draco would try to find some way around it, but they couldn't discover his hidden plans, because he wouldn't have any.

_I begin to see why Albus talked so often about honesty being the shield that no arrows could pierce._

_Though that is still an intolerably medieval metaphor._

"You will know better when I am finished with you," Severus said calmly. "I don't want to conquer your mind, but I do want to understand you." He heard Draco's hard exhale, and eyed him. Draco hastily slammed his gaping jaws back together. "And I want to make sure that the threat you present to the Ashborn is lessened."

Potter laughed at him, the kind of breathy, hollow sound that a laughing skull might produce. "And why should I care about _that_? If I want to take your rotten power away from you, then I ought to be able to do that—"

"Potter."

That was Draco, of all people, intervening. Severus decided to lean back and let him do so, unless he received some proof that Draco was trying to get in the way and dissuade Potter from listening to him.

Draco gave Severus an uneasy look, which he returned impassively. Draco proceeded to ignore him and to focus on Potter. "I don't think he means that you're less of a threat to the Ashborn because you could take them away from him and he doesn't want you to do so," he said. "I think he meant that you would be less suicidal if we understood what was driving you, and that means that you're less likely to wake up mad some fine morning and destroy us all _that _way."

Potter snorted as though that had never occurred to him and wouldn't have concerned him if it had. "So _what_? Who cares? He ought to know that how I die is my business. There's nothing in the Unbreakable Vows about that, so long as I don't provoke him or one of the Ashborn into doing it."

"I would prefer that you not tear apart my fortress," said Severus, and marveled at the clenched-tooth half-hysteria that his light, amused tone drew from Potter. Ah, yes, that was fine. He would use such a tone in the future, and he reckoned that it would be more useful than some threats. "And, of course, I wish to keep my hostage alive."

Potter was all but glowing now, as that dark aura Severus could see, the one that said someone was close to death or thought so, appeared around him again. "_So _sorry to disappoint you," Potter purred. "Of course you would want that. But, again, if I choose to die, then that's my business."

"You don't want to stay alive?" Draco whispered. Severus couldn't tell from his lowered voice if Draco was horrified, fascinated, or frightened by the idea. Even when the boy had undergone torture, Severus thought, Draco had never ceased wanting to live. Heroic suicide such as Potter seemed to be contemplating was not for him.

"I don't want to stay alive if it would serve my enemies, or lead to slavery," Potter said. "Like your slavery." Draco flinched and lowered his eyes as if he hadn't expected to be addressed so personally.

"It would not," Severus said, and a careful, firm tone also made Potter look at him as if crazed, foam all but falling from his mouth. _Did his guardians use such a tone? _"It would help. It might convince me that the Ashborn are less efficient and less entertaining than a group of free people in full possession of their faculties."

"I can't take the chance," Potter said, and now his body seemed to vibrate with what was all but a croon of hatred. "I won't stay alive on the chance that I could help them and then see you treat them badly again, you _bastard_—"

"Please," Draco said suddenly, and then leaned in and clutched at Potter's arm, burrowing his head into Potter's shoulder. Potter stopped ranting and stared at him in astonishment. Severus leaned back, careful to keep his smile hidden. Sometimes, Draco aided Severus's plans, and he did not even know it.

"Don't stay alive for them, then," Draco muttered. "Or him. Or yourself, even, although personally I think you're crazy if you want to die. Stay alive for _me_." His hand caressed Potter's chest, then gripped Potter's own. "Please."

"This is—silly," Potter said, after a few moments of surprise so great that Severus thought him physically incapable of anything but holding Draco and staring at him. "We were talking about my memories, not about suicide—"

"It is your memories that make you feel as you do," Severus cut in, quietly. The right words at the right time would outweigh all the persuasion that he might bring to bear on Potter. "Do you not wish to cure that? If you could be rid of your tendencies to think death best, to break out in unpredictable rages and wake sweating from nightmares, would you not want to be?"

Potter twisted his head away. "Of course I don't want to cure them," he said. "Not when they offer certain advantages, the way that my memories keeping you out of my mind do."

But Severus had seen the tremor of uncertainty at the corners of his eyelids. Yes, give him the choice and Potter would choose to recover from those memories. He was not all blades and battle and restlessness and magic. He wished to be able to lay down his burdens, to rest.

It was his sodding nobility, his conviction that he should suffer for everybody and everyone, that prevented him from doing so. If having nightmares helped him stay independent and thus protect Draco and the Ashborn from Severus, then he would certainly consider it his duty to do so.

Severus shook his head. There was an odd, confused gratitude welling up in him, that Potter had brought challenges back into his life and taught him this, as well as wonder that Potter could ever feel such things in the first place, and exasperation that he would rather cling to them than admit human needs.

And curiosity, of course. Severus wanted to understand the source of the memories he had seen, because understanding complex problems was what he did.

"You can have what you want," Severus said. "And at a low price—"

Potter twisted back around and snarled at him again. "My independence and my ability to think for myself, you mean? All those poor little party tricks of the mind that I wasn't using anyway?"

Severus felt his lips twitch. "Party tricks of the mind" was good, and he would have to remember it. But he shook his head. "Not what I meant at all," he said calmly. "You tell me about the memories. I aid you in putting them to rest, and you're free of the nightmares. You can oppose me more ardently, I would think, when free of such preoccupations."

The fire caught in the deep green eyes. What Potter would not do for himself, he would do for others.

_So like his mother in that._

"What do you get out of it?" Potter demanded.

"I believe I already told you," Severus murmured, but since Potter still squinted at him, he rolled his eyes and relented. "My hostage alive. Understanding of what I saw, what I cannot quite believe. I am sure that your childhood was not as bad as all _that_."

He loaded his voice with deliberate disbelief, and Potter all but snarled as he rose to the challenge. "Fine, Snape. You want it, you have it. But not because you asked." His hands came down to rest on Draco's shoulders, and he rocked him a little. "You can sit up now, Draco," he added, in a gentle voice that Severus apparently didn't deserve, as yet.

Severus watched in contentment as Draco stirred. _As near an equal exchange as we can come, with a bit more work on my side. But what I have is another interest in life, and there is nothing more precious than that._

_ Except Draco, perhaps._

* * *

Draco kept his head bowed until he was sure that he would have the right expression on his face when he looked up. They would think him weak, since he had hidden his face in Harry's chest and wailed like that.

But he had what he had wanted, too.

A response from Potter. A promise that he would be at Draco's side as Draco strove to find himself again.

And perhaps interest from Severus, too, given the way that his eyes lingered on Draco's face—a fact he didn't seem to recognize himself.

A mask of weakness had served Draco well before. He saw no need to abandon it until he wished to.


	15. In Motion

Thank you again for all the reviews!

_Chapter Fifteen—In Motion_

"And how does this affect us?" Thera took a delicate bite from the treacle tart that Harry had brought out that morning. Even though the older centaurs usually ate horse rather than human food, it seemed there were some human dishes they were unwilling to leave completely up to their fillies.

Harry sighed and shook his head, looking around the garden. It was still early, only a few minutes away from dawn, and he hadn't realized how different it would look. He could smell more flowers than he could see. "I don't really know?" he said hopelessly. "Except that it might mean Malfoy and I work better together now, so it could mean good things for the alliance, as well."

Thera paused and cast him a skeptical glance. "You realize that sooner or later, someone must go to the vampires?"

Harry made a face. "God, I know. Next time, we'll send them a proper pure-blood like they asked for." He had to smile as he imagined Snape meeting Lady Zembaz. Perhaps she would like the taste of _his _mind better. Or, no, wait, Snape wasn't pure-blood, was he? His father was a Muggle. It would have to be Malfoy. _Too bad. _"But I'm not going near them again, in case this attempt to take over my mind happens again."

"The werewolves and the vampires," Kleianthe said sourly from nearby, where she was grazing. She had refused the treacle tart, and Harry didn't know whether that came from a genuine lack of interest, because she wanted to leave more for her daughter, or because she didn't want to eat anything Thera showed such interest in. "Two key pieces of the ancient alliance, and we are still missing them both."

Harry snorted. "The alliance is, what, a month old? At most, and that's if you start counting from the time I cast that spell to find the white raven." He had to pause and shake his head at that. He had been with the Ashborn a month—long enough to almost forget what it felt like to eat with other people, or not be doing crazy and stupid things because Malfoy or a centaur needed him to.

_Agreeing to Snape's little proposal was another crazy and stupid thing._

Harry ran his hand through his hair and shook his head again. Fine, it was crazy and stupid. So was Hermione's plan to get him out of here by playing on Snape's greed for a restored reputation, but Harry also thought it was the only thing that might work. So he would shut the hell up and let Hermione try, and he would shut the hell up and let Snape try, although how in the world he thought _talking _about his memories, like Snape was his therapist, would work…

_Shit. I reckon I can't shut up and let Snape try, if I have to be the one to talk at him._

But so far, there was nothing to indicate that Snape would start trying. It had been two whole days since he tried to read Harry's memories, and Harry had selfishly taken his time since then, resting and eating and hiding in his room, letting Draco explain—or not explain, since it seemed Harry had to do that—to the centaurs. Snape was always absent, usually in his lab, the few times Harry had decided to do something else stupid and ask Bellatrix.

So. Probably he had lost interest, or discovered some new experimental potion that had to be brewed right away. Harry was feeling cautious relief.

Thera frowned at him.

"What?" Harry asked. "If you tell me the old pure-blood alliance was established in a few months, then I'll laugh at you. They probably had to bicker about the food for at least that long before they could sit down and work on the negotiations."

"It's not that."

Harry started, and turned to face Kleianthe. Sometimes, she remained so quiet it was hard to remember she was there. But she'd turned towards him now, neck arched, and Thera was fading into the background in turn. Maybe only one centaur could speak at a time or something, Harry thought, half-hysterical, and this was also part of their politics.

"Then what is it?" Harry said, and met the centaur stare for stare. After a moment, her tail began to twitch. Harry smiled a little. Yes, Kleianthe wasn't the fortress of wisdom and calmness she'd seemed before he saw her lose in that argument to Thera. He could intimidate her if he needed to. He leaned back on the garden wall and waited for her to make her discussion of things clear to him.

"Only this," Kleianthe said. "That you seem uncommitted to this alliance. We have done you an honor by coming here. You don't seem to return that honor. Your eyes are always fastened on escape. It's there in the way you speak of the vampires and the werewolves. You see them as pieces to be moved about, as toys, not as serious allies."

"One of the vampires almost _killed _me," Harry said dryly. "Or at least took over my body and used me as a chess piece of her own. I think I take them seriously."

"But this is a hobby for you," Kleianthe said.

Harry nodded. "And since I made that clear from the beginning, I don't think you have much to worry about. Of course I'll take the chance to leave if I can. I'm here unwillingly, unlike you. But Draco would still be here, and I think Snape is starting to take this more seriously, if only because it matters to Draco. So, don't worry. You'll still have what you want, what you need. I just won't be part of it."

"We need you," Kleianthe said.

Harry eyed her in a jaundiced fashion. "You mean to tell me that even centaurs are impressed with the Great Harry Potter's fame?"

Kleianthe snorted; Harry thought it was the most horse-like sound he had ever heard her make. "Of course not. The point is that we need you because you are part of the alliance, and add to our strength. Break from us, and others may begin to think we are not serious about reestablishing the old bonds."

Harry closed his eyes in a slow, weary blink. Then he ended up shaking his head. "That doesn't work with me anymore," he told her, quietly. "Not now. You keep saying that the alliance gives strength to the people who are part of it, but so far, it hasn't done anything for _me._ It's given Malfoy some new perspective and confidence, and maybe it's taught you something about living with humans. But I don't have any children for the centaurs to foster. I already had plenty of confidence. All you have for me when I fail at bringing some new partners into the alliance is criticism, which I've already endured enough of in my life, thank you. So I might as well leave, because the alliance does nothing but weaken _me_."

Kleianthe, he saw, turned towards Thera. Thera nodded and made a gesture with her hand that seemed to encourage Kleianthe to stand down. She bent her leg in response and moved away to stand next to a young tree she seemed to be eating steadily for breakfast.

Harry glared at Thera. He had seen McGonagall do similar things when she caught him misbehaving in front of some other professor, and if he thought hard about it, he could remember Vernon doing the same to Petunia. "I don't need to be _handled_," he said. "If you have something to say to me, say it. But don't try and soothe me the way that you would soothe a naughty child."

Thera paused, and Harry didn't know if his point had actually struck her or if she was simply trying to pick her words carefully. He waited, arms folded. He thought literal steam would probably be rising off him if his magic was more powerful.

"The alliance has not benefited you so far, I agree," Thera murmured gently. "That does not mean it won't benefit you in the future."

Harry snorted, and saw Kleianthe's head twitch a little. Well, he hadn't chosen that sound in mockery of the centaurs or whatever other paranoid suspicion they had, he'd just done it because he felt like making that sound at the time. "All I have to base future experience on is past experience," he said. "And if everything continues exactly as it has so far—which I wouldn't be surprised to find—then it won't."

Thera nodded. "I understand, and I apprehend your discomfort."

"But you'll try and persuade me to stay in the bloody alliance," Harry finished sourly.

Thera flicked her tail once. "I think you are dwelling too much on the notion of personal benefits," she said. "As the alliance grows, more people will be added to it, people who can help you and counsel you."

Harry started at the word "counsel," and turned away to kick moodily at the grass so Thera wouldn't see it. "And more people that I have to help," he said. "I think that's the more likely scenario here."

Thera remained silent, swishing her tail. Harry wondered what she wanted him to say. Then he suppressed the thought ruthlessly. The problem was what he _could _say, what it would make _sense _for him to say, not what Thera wanted him to say. He turned and raised hostile eyes to her face.

She only looked at him, and then smiled. Harry tensed, ready to lash out if her smile was tolerant or weary, but she looked genuinely friendly.

"All right," she said. "I see that we can't convince you that the alliance will work for you yet. We may not be able to until we persuade the vampires and werewolves to join us. And as yet, we have done little except make recommendations and explain a bit of our politics to you. Perhaps _we _should be the ones to recruit the vampires." She turned her back and trotted over to another corner of the garden, reaching up to pluck the fruit that hung there down from the branches.

Harry shook his head and left the garden. If the centaurs started doing more for the alliance, Draco would probably like it, but Harry was becoming less and less convinced that he would.

Ron was right. He didn't owe anyone here anything, except not to break the Unbreakable Vows in a way that would make Snape attack. He wanted to leave and go home, and he should be able to, without worrying about the future of the Ashborn and the centaurs and Draco's bloody alliance.

But he knew he would stay here at least until he was convinced that his bargain with Snape wouldn't play out the way he had wanted. A huge sigh welled out of him, and he ended up bowing his head, rubbing his hand down the back of his neck.

All in all, he was in a grand mood for his first "session" with Snape.

* * *

"Come in, Potter."

Severus kept his voice light, as if distracted by the potion brewing in front of him, though in reality this was one he had made more than a dozen times and knew the steps of by heart. It would ease Potter to think he had come in unobserved, and could spend some time observing Severus before he turned around. At the moment, Severus desired nothing so much as that Potter was at ease.

_A marked change of ambitions for you._

Severus gave a small shrug which remained entirely mental. The only ones who did not change were the dead. He had resembled them this past year, once he had settled into his perfect, calm, stagnant life. Potter had offered him a way out, and Severus would pursue it until he found his way back into the life he always could have had.

"So. Are we going to talk about my memories, or not?"

And yes, _that _sounded like Potter, sharp words and judgmental attitude and all. Severus kept the realization out of his eyes as he turned around and nodded. "We are. When you settle yourself comfortably in front of me, we will begin."

Potter looked around the lab as though there was a lack of comfortable chairs. In fact, Severus had cleared several seats in anticipation of this day. Potter had a choice between sitting on a chair, a bench, a second chair noticeably smaller than the first, and a table Severus had found incapable of supporting cauldrons in the huge sizes that he preferred.

After a few seconds of hesitation, Potter chose the smaller chair. Severus noticed his defiant glare as he sat down, and suspected that Potter would loudly object at any attempt to analyze him from his choices.

Such as that he was someone who was used to getting the worst of everything. Such as that his choices reflected deep-seated insecurity about his own value. Severus dried his hands on the towel in front of him and kept those thoughts out of his face, too, as he took the larger chair across from Potter. It was important to keep him on edge, because if he was relaxed, Severus doubted he would confess anything about his childhood. A disturbance in his memories had brought Severus into them last time; he needed Potter's cooperation, but not his cheerfulness.

_Though I hope to win that, too, in the end._

He arranged his face in a patient expression and waited. After a few moments of muttering and kicking at the legs of his seat, Potter reared back and stared at him with hatred enough to make Severus give him an inquiring look.

"I don't like this," Potter said, his voice charged with lightning. "I know it's necessary because you think that—you think that I'm going to go mad tomorrow or something, and Draco thinks the same thing. And we made a bargain."

Severus nodded. "We did."

"Fine." Potter combed his fingers through his fringe and stared at the floor. "So."

He let silence stretch between them for so long, Severus almost imagined he would not begin speaking again. But Severus had outwaited dragons and hunting cats and unicorns in his time, in pursuit of the Potions ingredients he needed. He waited, and after a few moments, Potter shook his head and spoke in an explosive mutter, as if his words were charges of powder.

"Fine. This is what I remember. My aunt and uncle weren't happy that I was there. They never were, and I knew that they forbid me to talk about magic or even say the word, but I didn't know _why_. I just thought it was because they wanted to be normal and it wasn't normal to be taking care of your orphaned nephew because his parents had died in a car accident."

Severus stared at him, and picked apart this incredible speech in his mind before deciding what he should attack first. He chose the last part. "When did you learn what you were? What your parents had been?"

Potter frowned at him as though he had said something stupid. "When I went to Hogwarts. Dumbledore sent Hagrid for me. He was the one who told me the truth." He was sitting up now, no longer ducking his head like a sullen boy. "What, do you think I should have known it earlier? _How_? When wizards hide themselves from the Muggle world, they do a bloody good job, and it's not like my relatives would have told me!"

Severus smiled a bit, which of course Potter took as more contempt and shook with the hatred of. Good. Along with the edge that would make him speak, Severus thought it good for Potter to experience emotions other than the damnable calm he had showed so far. Perhaps that would gratify Draco, as well, if he was so anxious to see that Potter was still human.

"I do not say that you should have known," Severus said, and let his voice trail off in what could have been a thoughtful pause while Potter stared at him and fumed. "I _do_ say," he went on after the pause, "that asking more questions would have served you well more times in your life than this one."

"If you knew," Potter said, leaning forwards and lowering his voice, "what it was like, in that house. If you knew what my aunt looked like when she said that I mustn't ask questions. I thought something horrible would happen. And then I went to Hogwarts and _did _ask questions, and no one ever answered me, or only did it when it was too late. Why Voldemort hated me. Why you hated my father. Why Voldemort survived what my mother did to him. What I had to do to defeat him."

"You know why Dumbledore could not reveal the knowledge of the Horcruxes to you," Severus said, and felt the cushion of the chair shred under his grip. "He did not know of them himself until he began to investigate the Dark Lord's past."

"God, you can't say it even now, can you?" Potter asked, and curled his lip. "His name was _Voldemort_. He's dead. He can't hurt you."

"One does not rouse the ghosts of one's past without reason." Severus forced himself back towards the calm he had desired, the true control of his emotions rather than the false control that speaking to Potter like this was supposed to give him. "I would not—"

"But I'm rousing the ghosts of _my_ past without a good reason." Potter sneered at him. "Just because you think that you might actually be able to cure me, never mind that we've never got along—"

"If you believe that getting along has anything to do with this," Severus said, and openly rolled his eyes now as he felt his emotions tilt back towards the center once more, "then you do not understand what I am trying to do here. I am trying to dig out the memories that cause your nightmares and your suicidal thoughts _because you buried them. _If you could dig them up on your own, or with the help of a sympathetic friend, we would not be here. Instead, none of your friends are sympathetic or stern enough to help you. They would rather leave you alone to deal with the pain—"

"Shut _up_ about my friends, Snape—"

"No, I will not," Severus said, and watched the fury shimmer in Potter's eyes in response to his sneer. "They're part of the reason for this, aren't they? Because until you met them, you didn't _have _any."

The blast of wandless magic slammed him against the back of the chair and made the chair tilt on its legs. Severus righted himself with a simple shifting of muscles, not drawing his wand. He knew, as he watched those eyes turn the color of coal, that Potter would react badly to the sight of a weapon.

Even though it would have comforted Severus himself.

But he never would have begun these sessions with Potter if what he wanted was _comfort_, and he despised himself for even thinking the word. He held himself rigidly under control, and watched as Potter's hands clenched open and shut. Then Potter looked away and closed his eyes.

"Yes, that's right." His voice had gone back to the calm, passionless thing he had used when speaking to Severus and Draco in the recent past. Severus was determined it would not stay there, but at the moment, he had little reason to assume it would, and every reason to give Potter some extra play on the line. He listened, with the kind of silence that Potter tried, uselessly, to fill. "My cousin made sure that I didn't have friends at the primary schools I went to, and then my uncle and aunt enforced it at home." He turned around, and his eyes were like green glass. "I suppose now you'll tell me that I was shit at keeping friends, and at defending myself when I let Muggles do that to me, and you'll want me to admit I knew that all along and I've just been making excuses."

"Why should I say such a thing?" Severus replied, just as calmly. "It would only confirm your intolerable victim complex."

There was a long silence. Potter's eyes narrowed.

"Then what do you want me to say?" he demanded. His anger was rising back to the surface again, and Severus felt his breath come short at the sight. That could have been fear alone, now that he had some idea of how powerful Potter was, but he didn't think so. But this was not the time to think about it, so he put it aside for later. "What do you—listen, Snape, we can't make progress on this because there's nothing I can say that will satisfy you. That's the simple and plain truth, isn't it? So I can just—"

"I am going to do something much worse than talk about how weak and stupid you were, Potter," Severus broke in. "That would only mimic the techniques of your relatives, and dig deeper the wounds I aim to heal."

Silence again. This time, Potter was the one leaning forwards, trying to compel him to fill it, but Severus did not choose to be compelled until he wished to speak.

"I am going to tell you how strong you are," Severus said. "How splendid. All the things that you only ever dared think in the silence of your head, with the conceit of the young, and then push away again, because God forbid that you comfort yourself. At bottom, you still feel the self-loathing that your relatives taught you to. This time, I am going to point out your achievements, and make you proud of them."

"You can't—that would be agonizing for you." Potter's face was working through so many emotions Severus shuddered a little as he watched it. Yes, he had undoubtedly done much the same thing when Potter provoked him, but he _hoped _that he had not done it with such—such absolute loss of dignity. "You don't need to do that. There's nothing you could hope to gain by it."

"I would gain by seeing _you_ writhe in agony," Severus pointed out cordially. "And I am seeing that now, from the beginning. Your instant defensiveness when I speak about your virtues is pleasant. And enlightening."

Potter lowered his head into his hands and lifted them, clasping them around his face. Severus watched him. He could see Potter's breathing falling into a steady pattern. Interesting, that. It made Severus wonder who had taught Potter a pattern more appropriate for meditation than anything else.

And why he had wanted to learn such a thing. Surely uncontrolled emotion, boundless passion, was useful during the war, driving him onto his goal when other goads Severus could think of would have fallen still. He had also once believed that it was impossible for Potter to master himself.

Not true. But disastrous when he tried. It rendered him suicidal and snappish in other ways, although it might have spared the lives of a few people, like Draco, who had confronted him in ignorance of his power.

_Control and repression are not the same. _The lesson that Potter had yet to learn, and that it seemed Severus Snape was appointed to teach him. Severus sighed, and tried not to resent the notion. He had entered on this task of his own free will, after all.

When Potter looked up and spoke again, his voice was noticeably deeper and cooler than before. "You don't understand, Snape. Of course I acknowledge that I have some good points. If I hated myself as much as you're making it sound like I do, then I would have killed myself long ago. But I don't hate myself. I—judge myself. I needed to know exactly what I was capable of when I fought Voldemort, or I would have lost."

Severus nodded, saying nothing for long moments. Potter considered him as if wondering what Severus would do next.

"You value your capabilities," Severus said. "But your virtues? Your value as a person? That, I wonder about."

"I know people are valuable," Potter said, and his hands had already opened and shut once before he went on speaking. "That's never been a problem. Would I have risked so much to save other people if I didn't believe that?"

"People in general," Severus noted with satisfaction. "Yes, it is easy for you to believe that, isn't it? Harder to believe you, yourself, personally, have some value beyond the weapon that killed Voldemort."

Potter hissed at him like a dragon. Since he could not actually breathe fire, and neither did he slide into the thrilling syllables of Parseltongue, Severus chose to be unimpressed. "Shut _up_, Snape! I know what you're saying! You think I'm some poor, abused, weak child who grew up with evil relatives and never admitted what they did to him. That's _ridiculous_. Of course I know. How could I live with them, and afterwards, when I came into the wizarding world and saw how much I was valued, and not know?"

"Weak," Severus said. "A word that I would not think to apply to you, and yet it springs to your lips so easily."

Potter rolled his eyes. "You're only not thinking to apply it to me because I did that first. Does it anger you, Snape, to know that I've anticipated you and so you can't use it without sounding repetitive?" He had the audacity to smirk.

Severus shook his head. Yes, it was easier to keep his calm than he had thought it would be, given their earlier row. Then, he had still allowed his passions to control him. Now he had true self-mastery, not without feeling under the surface, but using that surface to win what he wanted from the boy. Potter's major mistake was that he affected indifference and then cracked the indifference and pretended he had not. If he intended to make Draco and Severus leave him alone, annoying them was not the way to do that.

"You are not weak," Severus said. "Abused, yes. Poor…not in the sense of riches, but in the sense of the way you think about yourself, yes, I think that epithet would be appropriate."

Potter said nothing. But his hands had clenched shut again.

"You are possessed of great courage," Severus said, beginning with the virtue that it would cause him the last pain to name. He had never greatly cared about courage, after all. "That much is so. That much is true. But do you think that you have nothing more than that? I wager that you do."

"What do you have to wager with?" Potter spat. "What do you have that I would care for? This fortress? The place is gloomy and cramped. And the Ashborn? They obey you because they're machines, not people. If you let Draco go, then there's nothing that I would stay here for."

Since Severus knew that was not the truth, he ignored it. _Perhaps Potter would be comforted to know that he does not possess the virtue of honesty. _"You have great intelligence, also. Not in Potions," he added, as Potter's head rose and his eyes flashed, with what looked like joy at having caught Severus out in a lie. "That is why I did not notice it in school. But in helping others, and noticing when they need help. At figuring out puzzling situations, as I saw you do several times in your memories. In recognizing tactical situations that you can use to your advantage, as you did with the memories that kept out Legilimency."

Potter squirmed and shrugged. "That's what Hermione says, too," he said at last. "It's no big deal."

"You killed the Dark Lord," Severus said. "In what way is that not, perhaps, the 'biggest deal' of the last century?"

"You sound like you're picking up a dead fly with salad tongs or something when you say it like that, did you know?"

Severus made sure that his smile stayed thin and that he gave Potter no hint that he wished to discuss his juvenile insult. "You underrate your own fame," he said. "Your coming to me and agreeing to be my hostage was enough to avert a war. That is power that others have sought centuries to achieve without winning it. So. You are powerful."

Potter shoved himself to the back of his chair, as if Severus's words were launched spears that he wanted to be ready to dodge. 'Of course a Slytherin would think that was a virtue, instead of an _accident _that I had nothing to do with," he snapped.

Severus sighed. This conversation was less organized than he could have wished—he had planned to discuss specific memories with Potter, including a few that came from the war rather than his childhood—but perhaps that was necessary, to establish a base that they could build from in the future. "Your mother sacrificed her life to save you the first time," he said. "But hunting and fighting the Dark Lord, which no one else was brave enough to do—"

"Dumbledore was."

_Albus. _Severus winced at the memory of pleading eyes fixed on him and the Unbreakable Vow tightening around his neck like a collar, and his voice came out more harshly than he had intended. "Not even Dumbledore did as much as you did. The Dark Lord _destroyed, _not held at bay or weakened. Yes, I call it a virtue. Why do you not do so? I had had the impression you were clearer-eyed about that than your friends."

Potter snorted, but he sounded a bit calmer. _Is praising his friends all that it takes to make him so? I will have to remember to do so in the future. _"Because power that you _struggle for _and _do something with _is different than what I have," he said. "I only have power because of people believing in me."

Severus paused. He knew the answer to that question, and he waited to see if it would emerge from the boy's—no, the young man's—mouth. But it did not. Potter simply glared back, his mouth shut.

"And because you supported that belief," Severus said. "Slaying a basilisk in your second year. Abandoning the safe haven of Hogwarts, or what many might have believed was a safe haven, to pursue the Dark Lord. Enduring torture and worse to make your way to the end of the quest. Yes, Potter, I quite agree that the power would come from their belief and nothing more if you had been a Neville Longbottom, cringing without the courage to support your reputation."

Potter leaned in again. "Don't talk about Neville that way. You have no idea how brave he was—"

"But you did something," Severus continued, lowering his voice. "This is what you deny with that false modesty of yours, which is false because you must know, under the bluster, that no one else has ever done something quite as extraordinary as you have. That is what I do not _wish _to see you deny, for it is foolish. Will you acknowledge you have been a hero the way you defined someone as needing to be to deserve the name, or must I drag the admission out of you?"

* * *

Harry closed his eyes and leaned his head against the back of the chair. His throat hurt, as if he had struggled against tears, though he knew in reality it was more like struggling against certain words that he had wanted to speak.

This was—

This was ridiculous, that was what it was. Snape had no reason to want Harry to feel better about himself, no matter what he insisted.

And Harry was edging closer and closer to something he had started suspecting about himself months ago, when he had told Hermione casually a large wound in his side no longer hurt and she burst into tears.

He said those things, he pretended that he didn't hurt and it didn't feel good when people worried about him and he could endure anything, because he was worried about what would happen if he didn't. What if he became the pampered, spoiled little prince Snape had always thought he was? What if he stopped appreciating all the sacrifices people had made for him, and acted like the dim-witted idiot that Hermione sometimes accused him of being?

He just—didn't want to not _appreciate _things, that was all. He didn't want to be like Dudley, to be like Malfoy the way he remembered him from school, to be like his father the way he'd seen him in Snape's Pensieve. And it was entirely possible that that might happen if he wasn't careful. He knew it, because Snape and everyone else had seen those traits in him even when he was trying his hardest not to let them come through. If he relaxed his guard, then they could probably creep through despite everything.

Maybe, though, it was all right when he was actually _living _with people like Snape and Malfoy. They would let him know in a second if he acted arrogantly, or if he was stupid. Hell, Snape had practically been telling him nothing else since they started talking this time, although he dressed it up as compliments.

In return, Harry could face up to the truth that, yeah, he had done things other people hadn't and he wasn't always like them, although he would oppose to the death any suggestion Snape might offer that that made him _better._

So he opened his eyes, and nodded a little, and said, "Yeah. I reckon I can."

It left them both there in ringing silence, staring at each other. Even though he had done what Snape wanted, Harry thought, Snape looked stunned.

A moment later, he cleared his throat. Harry leaped down from the chair and sped towards the door of the lab, eager to get away from there before he felt the urge to say something awkward. Snape _really _wouldn't let him get away with that, no matter how much it might seem like he would.

"Return tomorrow for another session," Snape said to his back.

Harry didn't trust himself to keep his temper if he responded. He nodded and stepped out into the corridor, closing the door behind him. The air outside the lab seemed far fresher than it had when he passed through it an hour or so before.

Then he cast the _Tempus _Charm and realized that it hadn't been even an hour.

He shuddered as he made his way to his room, Bellatrix following him like a slightly louder shadow. He didn't know if he wanted to rearrange the contents of his head every day or not.

But it was necessary to someday give the Ashborn back the freedom they had lost, and Malfoy the freedom to stand on his own. For that, Harry had to acknowledge, he would do almost anything.

_Yeah, I suppose I'm a hero through and through._

* * *

Once again, Draco had dreamed himself into the Forbidden Forest, and this time the werewolf appeared to have been waiting for him. She stared at him, teeth bared, but didn't leap back in surprise. A moment later, in fact, she gave a gracious little bob of herhead and moved to the side, gesturing with one hand.

Draco turned around and found another werewolf sitting in the dirt, sprawled so casually that he turned the messy leaves into a throne.

He was much heavier than the one Draco had first contacted, and had amber eyes and lengthened teeth when he smiled. Draco thought he'd have to speak carefully, so as not to cut his tongue on them, but it seemed to produce nothing worse in his voice than a slight accent.

"My name is Laughter," he said. "Sunflower told me that you'd come from a pure-blood alliance, to bring us into bonds of strength like the ones we used to have. Why don't you tell me more about this fascinating proposal?" He rolled forwards onto his elbows, as careless as though he'd been born with four legs, and Draco watched the muscles sliding in his arms and down his back, since the only garment he wore was trousers. "And I'll judge if it's worth our time or not."

Draco swallowed a little. He remembered the powerful vampire who had taken over Potter's mind, and wondered if he would come back with traces of the same thing.

Then he reminded himself werewolves couldn't read or control minds unless they had acquired Legilimens abilities as a wizard, independent of their condition.

_Werewolf bites might be magical enough to pierce through a dream like this and into the real world, though._

_But you want to be of some account on your own eventually, not just as an appendage to Severus and Potter._

His mouth dry, Draco began to speak.


	16. Unexpected Offers

Thank you again for all the reviews!

_Chapter Sixteen—Unexpected Offers_

"But you haven't yet told me why we should accept your changes to the alliance."

Draco tried not to let his hand shake as he reached out and picked up the shallow dish of water that the other werewolf had brought him. He didn't know if drinking dream-water could refresh him, but he would try it. And it did feel as if it was at least soothing his dry throat when it poured past his lips. He swallowed several times before he lowered the dish to the ground, and the other werewolf at once snatched it up and took it away.

_Who would think that someone who turns furry once a month has such a good political brain on him?_

Well, perhaps that was unfair, Draco had to admit. Someone who turned furry once a month didn't necessarily stop being _human_ in the times between. But no one had warned him about Laughter, and he felt a bit beaten-up, as though he'd been running for a long time in place instead of trading thoughts with a clever negotiator.

Laughter, meanwhile, looked no different than he had when he began speaking to Draco. He sprawled, still, in the grass, full-length, and gazed at Draco with an expression of calm pleasure and interest. He had taken Draco through the history of the present alliance, the past alliance, Potter's presence, the founding of the Ashborn, and the way that Severus intended to secure the Ashborn against attack, all without faltering or revealing the source of his information. Draco swallowed, and wondered if the liquid trickling down the back of his throat was actually blood.

"But what you say is extraordinary," Laughter began again, as though Draco had been saying something instead of reeling in the last few minutes. "You tell me that you don't understand what the old pure-blood alliance offered us, and then you say that you want us to be part of the new one."

"I still _don't _understand what the old pure-blood alliance offered you," Draco pointed out dryly. "Since you seem to keep changing the subject when that comes up."

Laughter's tongue spilled over his teeth again. "My apologies. I was trying to creep up on it, so as not to shock you. But I see you are a brave and experienced young man, who has undoubtedly dealt with harder things before, so I will be plain."

"Thank you," Draco said, and then frowned at the croak in his voice. Was Laughter mocking him? Draco had never felt less experienced.

"They gave us flesh," Laughter said.

Draco held himself rigidly in place, and was glad, for the first time, that the Dark Lord had had a habit of revealing disgusting surprises suddenly, as when he had told Draco that he had to break every bone in the hand of a captured Muggle. Draco never knew when a flinch meant that a harsh blow would fall on someone else, usually his parents or Severus, so he had trained himself to avoid them.

"I see," he said levelly. "Well, yes, if these were firstborn children, then someone might object to that."

Laughter lived up to his name and gave a series of soft yips. They seemed to echo in the space between his ears more than ordinary human laughter would, and made Draco's head hurt. Or maybe they just made the space between his ears feel _wider_.

"Nothing so grand," Laughter said, and grinned. "They gave us the flesh of condemned criminals, those who otherwise would have died. They let us hunt them."

"Kill them," Draco said.

"Sometimes," Laughter said. "We are unpredictable when running under the influence of the moon, even with Wolfsbane in our veins. And, of course, quite often we have no Wolfsbane." His face was quiet, unreadable. "Sometimes we chose to bite and turn them. It was up to our instincts, and the atmosphere in the woods, and whether the prey gave us a good chase or tried to end it immediately."

Draco shook his head. He knew what Severus would say without thinking about it. Severus's feelings about werewolves struck Draco as irrational most of the time, but not in this way. "The leader of the Ashborn would never allow that."

"Your lord. Your lover. Your protector." Laughter stretched out in the leaves again, this time completely on his belly in a way that made Draco wince, and studied him. "Can you make decisions without him?"

"I can't make decisions without other members of the alliance," Draco said, glad he had that much of an excuse to fall back on. "Of course."

"But from what you told me, and more than told—what you _hinted_—your Snape is not a member of this alliance," Laughter said. "You referred to him as a source of your strength, but not the other way around. He might back you, he might avenge you if you're killed, but that's not the same as supporting you wholeheartedly and giving his support to others that you might bring into the alliance. Is it."

Draco swallowed hard, and ignored the way the skin on the back of his neck prickled. His scent had probably already told Laughter what he felt. For the sake of his own dignity, though, Draco would strive not to show it. "He'll come around with time," he said. "And permit me to say that your intelligence is _terrifying_." Laughter might be the sort easily distracted by compliments. Draco didn't know, because he hadn't tried yet.

Laughter didn't smile or stir from his place, except to lean forwards a little, as if he thought he had to catch Draco's eye even though he already had his full attention. "Listen," he said. "I want to make sure that all our partners in the alliance, if we do decide to join it, have the good sense to realize what they're getting into."

"Of course you would want that," Draco snapped, more than a little irritated Laughter would think he needed to make plain something so obvious. "That doesn't mean you need to doubt my word about Severus."

"I don't need to," Laughter said, "not when your scent and your reactions cast that doubt for you. What you must realize, little one, is that we have no _need _of this alliance, not the way we once did. We can keep ourselves alive here, even through the conflicts with the centaurs that I'm sure they've told you about."

"I see," Draco said stiffly, his every sense feeling as though it stung from the idea of "little one," and began to rise to his feet. "Then you don't mind if I leave, because it's obvious we have nothing to offer you."

"I mentioned the price of the old alliance," Laughter said, coming to all fours like a large dog getting ready to spring, "because that was historical fact. That does _not _mean we will only accept that price for the new alliance, should we decide to join it." His eyes shone like dull moons. "There is something we want more."

"What?" Draco asked warily. It sounded like the old price had given the werewolves a means to recruit new members as well as pleasure and a chance to indulge their instincts. Draco couldn't think of anything else that would be acceptable.

"Help," Laughter said. "And we will give help in return."

"Help," Draco said, and suspected he looked like an idiot repeating the word like that. Laughter's eyes flashing in amusement certainly said so. Draco lifted his head and looked as calm as he could, but he couldn't help the way that his fingers twisted in his robes. "What do you want help to do?"

"That," Laughter said, as if thinking about what he should say before he said it, "is rather private, don't you think?"

"No," Draco said. "Not if what you want is illegal or in some way against the principles of our alliance."

For a moment, he thought that he might have succeeded in upsetting Laughter; the werewolf's muscles tensed, and his claws scraped through the leaves at his feet as though he would spring to them. Draco swallowed and got ready to move. Even if Laughter didn't move, he simply wasn't _eager _to test what a werewolf bite would look like when he came out of the dream.

Laughter opened his jaws and snarled into Draco's face, and then seemed to remind himself that Draco might not know the hidden nature of werewolf politics and what he'd stumbled into here. He settled down with a sniff and a stretch of his muscles, but his sharp stare at Draco said he would remember this. Draco swallowed and didn't move. Laughter's fingers flexed out again, his nails scraping through the leaves, before he shook his head and sat up.

"We want help to live our lives," Laughter said. "To get Wolfsbane. To set out our desired territory in such terms that the centaurs won't ever intrude into it and then claim it was an accident. To remind new werewolves that they have options other than to turn into ravening monsters or become repressed and sad hermits in their own lives. That they can turn to us."

Draco nodded slowly. "The centaurs seem to think that you spend more time intruding into _their _territory."

"They would say that, wouldn't they?" A long ripple ran through Laughter, and Draco shivered. He wouldn't want to be near when the ripple became the fluid motion that it looked like. "Because they're part of the alliance, and at the moment, you have no reason to disbelieve them. But when we are an equal part of the alliance and our voices are heard, you will not find it so easy to accept a centaur perspective."

Draco contented himself with a temperate smile for now and cocked his head. "And what would you offer in return?"

"Help training those who are new to their lycanthropy but don't want to live with the packs," Laughter replied at once. "Rare Potions ingredients from the depths of the Forest, where few humans want to venture." Draco hoped the immediate widening of his eyes he could feel didn't give him away too much. He knew Severus would be interested in _that_. "A few other things we can gain because we live in the Forbidden Forest, and _with _it, in ways that most other humans don't dare to." He paused and gave Draco a calculated glance. "Do you think that is enough to begin the bargaining?"

Draco had to walk a line here; he couldn't appear either too eager or too depressive about what the werewolves could likely offer. He gave a slight shrug and nod. "To begin it."

Laughter showed his teeth, but Draco thought it was a smile rather than a snarl. He thought. "Then go back to your lord and master and see what he says," Laughter said, and bounded to his feet. He paused to glance over his shoulder at Draco. "If you want my advice, you will make him part of the bargaining as soon as possible."

Then he was gone, springing into the forest like a deer. For a few moments, the other werewolf lingered, staring at Draco; he had the strangest feeling that she was about to ask him if he needed help finding his way out of the Forest. Then she snapped her head down, made a chuffing sound, and burst into motion. In moments, she had blurred into the forest and was gone.

Draco closed his eyes and began to let the sensations of dirt and leaves fade, aiming for the surface of sleep. His mind seethed with notions that he wanted to discuss with Potter, who, while he didn't always have good political instincts, would give Draco his attention when he realized where he had been.

And those notions he wanted to discuss with Severus.

He would have to bring Severus into the alliance, Draco decided, opening his eyes and staring up at the ceiling. He didn't like the way his pulse beat and fluttered in the back of his throat, and he didn't like the notion that the mere _thought _of confronting Severus was enough to make him shake, but that was the way it was.

Laughter had pinpointed one of their weaknesses. Draco and Potter and the centaurs all lived under the roof that the Ashborn owned and controlled—and Severus owned and controlled the Ashborn. Without his support, they could lose the shelter as well as the chance for Kleianthe and Thera to raise their children among humans.

_And haven't we been doing a wonderful job with that, _Draco thought, grimacing a little, as he thought about how the centaur fillies still seemed afraid of them. He and Potter had been busy with their own concerns, of course, but not every day. And still they spent little time with them.

This alliance had started as his hobby. It had become a real thing—and whether or not it would ever have become real without Potter was beside the point, Draco thought. He had to do more important and bigger things now, things that _mattered _and were difficult, such as bringing Severus in. He had to take an active role, not lean back in the corner and let others help him. Sometimes that worked, as when Potter welcomed the centaurs, but more often it seemed that he didn't quite get what he wanted.

And if he could do it while maintaining the pretense of weakness that had brought Severus and Potter together so far…

Draco felt a vicious little smile curl his lips as he began to dress. Of course it wouldn't be easy. But then, he thought nothing worth doing ever was.

* * *

"Potter."

Harry turned his head and blinked. He had assumed that neither Malfoy nor Snape would find him in the little garden he'd chosen, since it was full of thorns and weeds, but he reckoned Bellatrix at the door was a giveaway. He swallowed a little and sat up, wondering why Malfoy's cheeks glowed with self-importance.

_Maybe Snape just fucked him._

Harry frowned and flicked a whip-like thought at the stupid part of his brain, making it whimper and retreat. Shaking his head, Harry said, "You wanted to talk to me about something, Malfoy?"

Malfoy nodded and sat down beside him on the bench. It was a narrow thing, carved out of dark stone with skill but without, Harry thought, the foresight that someday someone would try to use it as a seat for two people, and Harry wanted to shift his weight away. That might make him look afraid, though, and he refused to be weak in front of someone who needed his help the way Malfoy did. He just nodded.

"I think you should call me Draco," Malfoy said.

Harry thought about it, then shrugged. He reckoned he could do that without sacrificing too much of his pride. "If that's what you wanted to talk about, then sure," he said. "I do some of the time, anyway."

Malfoy turned an unexpectedly intense gaze on him. "But I want it all the time," he said, in a tone that Harry would have thought more appropriate to begging a favor from Snape.

"Er," Harry said, and wondered why the air between them felt like stretched candy. He turned his head away and stared intently at a small thorn tree leaning against the wall to get rid of the feeling. But it went on, coating his muscles with stickiness, covering him when he tried to lean away. He settled for sighting and said, "Fine. But that doesn't seem important enough to seek me out like this."

"It's not the only thing I have to tell you, no," Malfoy said, and caught his hand. "But it's a start. I've decided that I have to go more aggressively after the things I want, and this is one of them."

Harry stared down at the hand on his wrist. Malfoy bit his nails, he realized with a shock that seemed to hit him in the middle of the stomach. He didn't know why, again. He had known for a long time, back in Hogwarts even, that Malfoy wasn't the refined, aristocratic type that he liked to present himself as. "Fine," he said. "Draco."

Malfoy's hand didn't fall away, though when Harry glanced at him, he was smiling and nodding as if satisfied. "Good," he said. "One of the other things I want from you is more of a commitment to the alliance."

"The centaurs were talking about that, too," Harry said. "And I have no reason to make that commitment if I leave with my friends, if they find some way that I _can _leave without breaking the Unbreakable Vows."

"You don't know that will happen," Malfoy said, and his voice had lost any trace of teasing humor it might have had. Had it been there in the first place? Harry doubted it. He had been looking frantically for it despite himself, because it would make things easier. But things that would make his life easier rarely existed. "You could have to stay, and the alliance will be stronger with you."

Harry twisted to his feet and broke the hold Malfoy had on him. _Draco. You should start thinking of him as Draco, because otherwise you'll probably call him "Malfoy" when you don't mean to and upset him._

Harry snarled and hunched his shoulders. In the mood he was in, the very last thing he felt like hearing about was another obligation. True, this wasn't a large one, but at the moment, it seemed to symbolize everything he was expected to do.

"Potter?" Draco's voice had taken on a gentle tone behind him, but also a politely baffled one. Harry stared at the nearest thorn and wondered that it didn't boil from the heat of his stare. _How dare I not want to do what he wants me to? How dare I not want this great burden that he's holding out to me like a treasure?_

"I'm expected to do too much for the alliance," he said. "Go after the vampires, welcome the centaurs, play nice with Snape, treat you as if you're my friend. And the centaurs can say all they want about how someone will arrive someday who'll have the time to spare for _me_, but that's ridiculous. Every new partner the alliance gets will impose a new obligation."

"I know I haven't done much so far," Draco said, his voice calm and accepting in a way that infuriated Harry. "I'm willing to make up for that. I know I have to do more in the future."

"Make up for me, then," Harry said, turning around and facing him. "Be the efforts of two people. Because I won't be here."

"You don't know that that will happen," Draco said again, and it would have been so much easier to think of him as _Malfoy_, because his hair was blowing back from his forehead in a little wind dashing through the garden, and Harry didn't think he was ugly. The last name would be a barrier between them it would take more than politeness to breach. "You could have to—"

"I don't have to do _anything _like that," Harry said, and he felt the giddy urge welling up in him that he hadn't felt since the moment he destroyed Voldemort. He had wanted to lash out, burn the world, end everything. Just in that moment, because afterwards had come the peace and the realization he had won, but in that moment, yes. He took a step towards Draco, who sat up straight and stared at him. "I have to obey the Vows. I have to stay a hostage to secure the peace between the Ashborn and the people who followed me, at least until Hermione can come up with an alternative Snape likes better. I don't have to sacrifice anything for the alliance or you. That was something I only agreed to help with because I was bored, remember? Not a lifelong commitment."

Draco frowned at him. "But it is. If you enter an alliance like this with someone, you give your word, and you stay bound unless someone else betrays you, because that's the way it _works_."

"Of course you would see it that way," Harry said. "You're pure-blood, and that automatically makes you better and more honorable than me. More fit to go speak with werewolves, or vampires, or whatever else is alive and waiting for you out there." His heart pounded, and he had to pause to take a few deep breaths, but he no longer thought he might kill Draco. He was tired, that was all, tired of being scolded by members of the alliance and told that he should take it more seriously when he had made his motives clear from the beginning. "Zembaz took you sending her a half-blood as an insult. I think you should take a cue from that and let me go."

* * *

Draco hesitated. He had assumed, without thinking about it much, that of course Potter would honor the alliance. He had given his word, and he was a Gryffindor, and what better things did he have to do while he was a hostage?

He had forgotten, as he had before, that Potter was more than just a Gryffindor. And he didn't stop being whatever else he was when he became a hostage, any more than Draco gave up what he was when he was temporarily under Severus's control.

Draco rose to his feet. Potter immediately sharpened on him and studied him as though he was expecting Draco to draw his wand and hurt him. Draco shrugged. He would have liked to have more of Potter's trust than this, but he didn't, which meant he had to speak.

"I think Zembaz would have found some excuse to invade the mind of anyone we sent her," he said. "Even Severus."

Potter snorted. "Well, he's a half-blood like me, isn't he? So of course she would have been as insulted by sending him."

"Stop it!" Draco took a long stride towards him, stopping himself in the middle of a patch of thorns that snagged at his boots. "Stop it," he repeated more quietly, while Potter stared at him with wide eyes. "I won't have you insulting him."

"I should have known it would be that," Potter said, rolling his eyes. "You still have all the pure-blood prejudices. You just make an exception for him, because if you didn't, then you probably would never forgive yourself for sleeping with him."

"You don't know me at all," Draco said, and despite himself, his voice cracked with what sounded like lightning in the middle.

"Say I don't." Potter took a step towards him, and Draco wanted to howl. Some part of him rejoiced at that even now, that he was provoking Potter, getting a reaction from him besides frozen niceness or a smile. "Say I learn more about you, and stay with you and do everything you want me to, just because you want me to. What's in it for me? _Nothing_. More duty, more responsibility, something to keep me from going mad while I'm a hostage—but Hermione's offered me a way out of that. That would be the best path for me to take. There's nothing here for me that can compete with the company of my friends."

"Your honor," Draco began.

"I don't owe _anything_ to people who only saved my life and sanity because they want to use me," Potter snarled back. "And I think Ron's right when he says I take those debts more seriously than anyone else. If I'd saved your life and nothing more, you wouldn't care twice about dropping me. It's just because I can do something for you, establishing this alliance, that you want me to stay."

Draco shook his head. He wanted to recover himself, but at the same time, he thought that would probably be deadly. Potter wouldn't deal well with calm, emotionless words. Draco needed to fall headlong, at least if he was going to make Potter fall with him.

"Come on, then, Potter," he said, and gave him a condescending smile. "What if I admitted to you that I _wanted _you here? That seeing you be smug and cool and distant drives me mad? That you're the only chance I have here for a friend, instead of an ally or a lover?"

"If you think you and Snape can't be friends because you're lovers, then that's really sad," Potter said, stabbing his legs into the ground as though he'd resist the tide Draco wanted to pull him to. "And indicates things that _aren't my problem to fix._"

"I'm not putting it that way," Draco said. "I'm saying I can give you more than your friends can."

Potter stared at him, then burst out laughing. The laughter really seemed to shake him to the ground, since he knelt there and started whooping with it. Draco started forwards, intending to kick his arse, but Potter rolled over and held up one defenseless hand, without his wand, and Draco had to stop, staring at him.

"You're not my friend, Malfoy," Potter said, mopping at his eyes and shaking his head. "You don't have the slightest notion of what I want, of what I'd like, what my friendship with Ron and Hermione gives me. And you can't make me happy about being here, no matter what you do." He grinned up at Draco through eyes that still gleamed with a few stray tears. "Nothing you can give me makes up for what I've left behind."

"Really?" Draco whispered, kneeling beside him. "So a chance to have a new role in the world doesn't suffice for you?"

"I wouldn't have a role," Potter said. "I wouldn't be anything more than a part of the alliance, since it doesn't have leaders. And I was a leader back in the outside world. That's what I…" He trailed off, frowning.

"That's not what you want again," Draco said. "You want friendship. Freedom. You want _something _to do with your life now that you've killed the Dark Lord. But I don't think that thing is really being the same kind of leader you were before. You don't like the way Severus leads the Ashborn—"

"Which has _nothing _in common with the way I intend to lead," Potter cut him off mercilessly.

"You want to change things," Draco said, and kept his voice low and breathless. He didn't know if he would have been able to raise it anyway, not with the wind of his own audacity sweeping him away. "This is the way to change them. Alter the Ashborn. Show Severus there are other ways to lead people. Spend time with your friends. I think Severus would be eager to arrange that, whether or not you stay a hostage."

"This is only the same thing you're already asking me to do," Potter said, with a dawning frown. "Spend all my time and energy taking care of people who aren't my friends."

Draco laughed in turn, and waited until Potter was glaring at him, his eyes spitting fire. Draco shook his head. "I doubt very much whether you can be content taking care of people who are only your friends," he said. "Don't your friends have their own lives? Their own ability to defend themselves? You have to live beyond them. With them, maybe," he added, seeing that Potter's stubborn mouth was opening, "but beyond them. What are your own fantasies and dreams and hopes? The things you want to do, not because you're bored or someone forced you into them?"

* * *

_Change things._

That was the immediate response Harry wanted to give to Malfoy's stupid statement, but he clenched his jaw to hold it back, because he knew that Malfoy would just reply that he was already changing things, or could, if he tried to take the Ashborn away from Snape.

Harry clenched his hands into fists and told himself again that he didn't _have _to listen. Malfoy was trying to get Harry to stay because he was lonely and nothing more. He couldn't want anything else from this, and he couldn't want anything Harry actually wanted to give.

But Malfoy's words were already in his head, and worming deeper.

_What do you want?_

Harry couldn't answer that question, beyond knowing that Ron and Hermione were safe and happy, and spending some time with them.

So he said that to Malfoy, who just nodded as if he was the wise one, and then shook his head in the next instant. Harry snorted. "What's wrong with it?"

"What I just told you a minute ago," Malfoy said. "You can't spend your whole life doing that, and taking care of their children, and cleaning up their shit. What do you want besides that?"

"To leave you behind," Harry snapped. "To leave Snape behind. To have people stop telling me everything I do is wrong, and I still have to sacrifice more and more."

"I'll sacrifice things as well, building this alliance. So will Severus."

"Then tell me what!" Harry scowled at him. "You haven't given up time that you didn't want to give up, studying the old alliances. That was a hobby until I came here and you suddenly had the power to really build the new one. You didn't confront Snape; I did that for you. You didn't greet the centaurs. I did—"

"And since then, I've fed them with you, and spent time with them, and learned more about them," Malfoy interrupted, his lip jutting out. "And I've been to the werewolves now, and found out that what they really want is help, even though they had something else when the old alliance was new."

"What something else?" Harry demanded.

"Human flesh."

Harry shook his head immediately. "I don't think werewolves are mindless monsters, but I won't help any of them who want to hunt us."

"Will you _listen_?" Malfoy reached out and seized his hand, squeezing down hard enough to make some of the bones in Harry's wrist hurt. "I just said they don't want that anymore. Their leader, Laughter, explained it to me. They want help obtaining Wolfsbane and teaching new werewolves and—and that kind of thing. And they'll help us in return. I don't know how, yet, but I know they will."

"And I reckon I'll have to help them, too," Harry muttered, and rested his free hand over his face. "That's part of the reason you want me to stay, isn't it? Because you know you have more people besides just the centaurs to please now."

"There are other reasons."

"To help you with Snape, right." Harry waved his hand. He felt as though someone was pressing an iron blanket down on him. "And Thera and Kleianthe. And the vampires, eventually, even if I can't be the one who negotiates with them. I don't know. Maybe it's better than being bored, but endless duties and the sense that I can't ever leave even if Snape frees the Ashborn because they keep increasing…" He shuddered. Only now did he realize one way in which he'd been lucky in hunting Voldemort: he knew it would end, someday. There was a limited amount of Horcruxes, and then there was a Dark Lord to kill. He'd grown bored and restless serving as a leader of his people in large part because he knew that that would never end.

"I can help you, too."

"How?" Harry glanced at Malfoy. "There's nothing you have that I'm not either going to share, like the duties of this alliance, or that I want, like your luxuries."

Malfoy winced and glared at him. Then he seemed to take a deep breath, and looked around the garden as though he expected someone to hide there, spying on them. "I want to be your friend," he said.

"Yeah, I remember you saying that," Harry said. "Another duty."

"I want you to be my friend," Malfoy says. "That's the duty. But I—I want to be your friend, too." From the way he spoke, he might have found cutting his veins open easier than saying the words; in fact, Harry was sure he would have. "I want to—make your stay here easier. Get a reaction from you. Leave you free to be honest with me, if I'm honest with you. All of that."

He was panting by the time he'd finished. Harry stared at him, trying so hard to decide what to say that his mind kept whirling and turning in place like a top, never coming to a rest. Finally, he shook his head and answered as gamely as he could. "One friend isn't going to be enough to make up for the loss of the rest of the world. And we've fought like bloody cats and dogs all our lives, Malfoy."

"_Draco_."

The tone stung like pellets of ice. Harry winced, but went on trying to explain. "Nothing's changed since I got here. If anything, it's got worse. How are you going to make friends with me with all that lying between us?"

Malfoy's hand turned wary on his wrist, and then let him go. Harry shook his hand out immediately, although he never took his gaze from Malfoy's face.

Malfoy went through his own long and silent struggle, or so it felt like. Then he picked his head up and said, "Listen. Will you listen to me without interrupting, long enough for me to explain? I think that's the only way I'll get through this."

"That doesn't sound promising," Harry muttered, but Malfoy went on staring at him, so he sighed. "Fine. I promise. Go ahead."

Malfoy might as well not have heard him, from the way he went on staring and muttering to him for a minute. Only when Harry snapped his fingers in front of his face did he jerk back to himself and grunt, nodding.

"Fine," he said. "I know you might still leave. But in the meantime, I want to try and—be honest with you. I've wanted a reaction from you since you came here." Harry opened his mouth to say that he'd had plenty of those, but Malfoy glared at him and Harry remembered his promise. He shut his mouth again. "Not pity, not just anger, not contempt. Something that goes deeper. Something like what I saw when Severus read your memories. Something that's just for me alone."

Harry rolled his eyes. He still didn't say anything, but he was thinking, _Of course. It's all for him, as usual. Nothing for me. I don't know why I let him talk me into listening._

"And I want to give you a reaction," Malfoy said. "Show you that you can trust me. Show you that I won't betray anything I learn about you, so it's all right to tell me things. Show you—show you that you've meant a lot to me, all these years. More than a mere Quidditch rival would have."

Harry glared at him. "Yeah, and I know why," he said, unable to hold his tongue any longer. "Because I refused to be your friend in the first place. If I'd agreed, I'd just be another faceless member of your court and you would ignore me the rest of the time."

"You think—you think I could ever _ignore _you?" Malfoy's astonishment felt like cold sweat on Harry's skin.

He shrugged. "Well, all right, reckon that would be difficult with the scar. But you still only want me as your friend because you've never had me."

"That's part of the reason," Malfoy said, and he was struggling now as if he was drowning. The words burst forth from him in long spurts, and then little drips and dabs of water. "But—but more is because I've _never _had someone like you. Let me have a chance. Severus isn't like you, neither were my friends in Slytherin, and I—I want to know you. To know why you want to leave so badly, and why you only laugh when your friends are here, and what Severus saw in your head that made him react like that."

Harry snorted. "You could just ask him."

"But he had to take the knowledge," Malfoy said. "I want it because you give it to me. That's the reason."

Harry blinked. He didn't know if Malfoy was being completely honest, but then, he reckoned Malfoy didn't know himself. He was sitting there, panting as if he'd run a long race out in desert heat, and he didn't know.

Harry considered it. This wasn't an obligation, like staying until the Ashborn were free or working for the alliance. If anything had demanded it, it was some impulse in the back of Malfoy's head that Harry still didn't understand.

And…well.

He knew Ron and Hermione and the Weasleys loved him. They didn't have to say it all the time. And he'd heard plenty of words that sounded disobliging from the Dursleys and Snape and the Death Eaters and all the other people who held him in contempt for one reason or another.

It was _weird, _hearing Malfoy talk this way. Harry had no reason to think it would be different from the selfish desires Malfoy had expressed so far, either.

But if he chose this, it was something chosen. A duty that wasn't a duty, that he didn't have to worry about walking away from, because if it didn't work, it was as likely to be Malfoy's fault as his own.

And this speech was new. He didn't _need _words like that from the people who really liked him. War and adventure had forged their bonds so tight there was no splitting them.

But sometimes, he thought he might want the words.

"Fine," he said. "We'll try. But the instant I think you're only using me to get what you want, and everything I give you is only another means of tying me into the alliance, then I'll walk away. Okay?" _I don't think it'll take very long._

Malfoy reached out and took his wrist again, but with a fire in his eyes this time that made Harry smile in spite of himself. "Harry," he said. "I can call you that?"

Harry rolled his eyes. "Trust you to push the boundaries the instant you can," he said.

Malfoy waited.

"Yeah, all right," Harry said. "Draco."

_It won't last very long. It can't. We're both too selfish, and I distrust him too much. I already have everyone I need._

But sometimes, he thought he might want someone to smile at him in that new, wondering way that Malfoy was doing right now, as if Harry was someone special, someone important, just for being who he was.


	17. Kinds of Union

Thank you again for all the reviews!

_Chapter Seventeen—Kinds of Union_

Severus took a step back from the cat automaton and looked at it critically. It was possible that he could improve it, he thought. He could, for example, make the glittering eyes less prominent. He could add less graceful movements to the beast, so that Draco would be able to distance it if he needed to. Severus liked the realism of watching his creations move like animals, not jerkily, but if Draco adapted poorly to his companion in the first place…

Then Severus shook his head. No, he would not think like that. He had made the gift, and if Draco rejected it, then that was what happened. He could not second-guess himself when he didn't know how Draco would react yet. He reached out and stroked his fingers down the middle of the cat's head, waking it to life.

It opened its eyes and lashed its tail around its feet, sitting upright like an Egyptian temple statue. It examined him. Then it turned its head away and looked around the room.

Severus nodded. So far, it was functioning as it had been designed to do. Draco was its master, not him. It was natural that it should look for its master.

The cat leaped from the table and prowled around the room, tail uplifted and the kink in it clearly showing. Severus had made the cat as he would make a Siamese, down to the regal features and the graceful shape of its front paws. Again, Draco could object, and Severus would take the automaton back and make changes in it. But Draco was the one who would have to decide on those changes, or whether he wanted the beast at all, not Severus.

The cat paused in front of the door, and its tail twined around in a circle so complete that Severus smiled. Then it looked up at him, and away again at once, as though disgusted to have to ask for a favor. Severus nodded and opened the door. Its personality was similar enough to Draco's that they might get along, at least.

_Or completely repel each other._

Severus smothered the doubt. Again, he refused to speculate. He had chosen the gift. Draco was the one who must do anything more than that.

The cat prowled down the middle of the corridor, stopping to stare at a few of the Ashborn as they went by. Severus was not sure what it made of them. He had instructed his other automatons to ignore the Ashborn, but had left the cat's image of them blank. Right now, it had a burning, Draco-shaped hole in what passed for its mind, and would seek until it found the person who filled that hole.

Before they reached the door of Draco's rooms, he opened it and stepped out into the corridor, yawning, his cheek flushed in a way that made Severus's throat tighten.

The cat lifted its head and sniffed at the air—a gesture Severus had built into it, since it responded far more to magical traces than to scents the way a real animal would. Then it redoubled its speed and wound around Draco's ankles when it reached him, staring up into his face. The spell that caused it to purr sparked to life, and the rusty sound came out of the bright metal throat with a convincing degree of realism.

Draco's face changed. But Severus didn't think he could name the emotion that shone on it now, and that he would not care to try. He watched Draco kneel down so that he could look at the cat face-to-face, and still it was hard to try.

He had promised himself he would not ask. He had promised himself that he would read only the most obvious signals, and then he would bow and walk away. If Draco sent the automaton back to him, then he would receive the message with no attempts to implore Draco otherwise.

But so much of what he had promised himself came from a place of certainty, undisturbed before Potter came and unstable since. So he knew the hoarse voice that spoke for his own, although nothing to be proud of. "Do you like it?"

Draco reached out and touched one of the ears without answering. The cat rubbed its face against his fingers in ecstasy, and Draco's face blossomed with a smile. He looked up and nodded.

"I had thought that the forms of the others…offended you," Severus said. It was the most delicate word he could choose without knowing exactly what the source of Draco's objections to them was.

Or perhaps he knew—that he paid more attention to them than Draco—and could not bring himself to admit that aloud, even now.

Draco shrugged, and then sighed and said, "You wanted—I wanted attention from them, too. But they obeyed you, and only you. This one will be _mine_." He moved to the side, away from Severus, and the cat rotated its head to continue watching him. Draco nodded and smoothed his hand down its back, fingers resting now and then against the metal as though he expected to find a patch of fur. "Yes. It'll pay attention to me, and it'll only obey me, won't it? Not you?"

Severus nodded. There was much he could have said, much he could have felt. Not long ago, he thought, he would have been disturbed at the notion that Draco was so delighted by that aspect of the cat. His suspicious mind would have encouraged him to believe Draco would use the cat as a weapon against him.

But not now. Not when he had learned to understand Draco better—or been forced to think more about him because of Potter's apparent influence over him, as he could admit was more likely to be the case, in the privacy of his own head. Now he knew it was Draco's pride in possession. He had mourned losing the Manor more because it was a place he had counted as his own than because it had belonged to his bloodline. He had been smug in the knowledge that he was Severus's only lover, that none of the Ashborn shared their lord's regard. And he likely felt much the same way about Potter. His friendship was a possession that Draco had never had, had not even shared with others. It had simply been denied him.

_If he needs it, then he shall have it. _

Severus had not known that _he _himself had such great need of Draco's regard until he discovered he might lose it. For that, he reckoned, he had to admit he had Potter to thank. The boy changed everything. He killed the Dark Lord, he made the world brighter for his friends, he ended the war that might have sprung up between the Ashborn and his followers by agreeing to become a hostage.

That meant…

It meant Severus had misjudged, again, and he would have to think more carefully about what he said to Potter the next time he saw him.

He stifled his sigh and looked back at Draco in time to see him gazing up shyly, an invitation in his eyes. The cat turned to Severus, too, and studied him critically, as though evaluating whether he was doing well enough to receive an invitation to bed.

"I've missed you," Draco whispered, and held out his hand.

Severus took it.

* * *

"I think it's the best way."

That was the line in Hermione's letter Harry kept repeating over and over to himself as he trudged towards his second "session" with Snape. Hermione had said her efforts at getting an article published in a Potions journal had gone nowhere so far, but that another journal had expressed interest. She would owl it to them and hope for the best.

Maybe it was for the best. Maybe his escape from Snape, his persuading Snape that he wanted something more than he wanted the Unbreakable Vows binding Harry to him, would of necessity be long and slow. Harry just didn't _like _that, was the problem. He wanted to break through the bonds now, to run up to Snape and shake him and demand his freedom.

But he couldn't, so he knocked on the door of the Potions lab with a sense of doom.

"Come."

Harry shuddered a little as he opened the door. _That _was one thing he hoped Snape never ordered him to do.

Snape was standing over a cauldron, peering into it with a frown. Probably just realized that a mindless Ashborn couldn't do as good a job on it as a resentful student, Harry thought, hiding a snicker. He had more than once taken out his frustration at a detention on the cauldrons Snape had given him.

When Snape turned around, his face was grave. Harry rolled his eyes at that. "What? Did Bellatrix display a sign of independent thought?" he asked.

Snape frowned, and then turned away and looked back at the cauldron as if it was the one who had spoken. Harry smiled. He recognized that trick. The Dursleys had used it when they wanted to show him he wasn't important enough to deserve much of their attention.

Then he shook his head. _You've gone from thinking of the Dursleys only once a month or so or when someone else brings them up to thinking about them all the time. That can't be good._

"Please sit down," Snape said, and nodded to the chairs in the room, as before. There was a new one this time. Harry chose it, to be contrary, and then stood up and moved back to the one he'd had before. The new one made him sink down until his neck was about level with the chair arms. If he had to move fast, or if he wanted to leap out of there and run off to leave Snape yelling after him, he wouldn't be able to.

Snape gave him a considering look. _Reading everything I do, as usual._ Harry sat in the chair with absolute normality—not slumping, not acting uncomfortable, not giving away any signals that would tell Snape anything he didn't want to tell—though he doubted Snape would read him that way. It was the _truth_, but Snape seemed more interested in how strange he could make Harry feel than the truth.

Snape took the other chair, and linked his fingers together in front of him like a kid playing with a string. "There are specific memories I saw and wished to speak about," he said.

"Okay," Harry said. He wasn't looking forward to this, but then again, he didn't look forward to most of his daily duties with the Ashborn.

_The only thing that isn't a duty is spending time with my friends. And Malfoy doesn't count among them. _Harry had started regretting the promise he'd made to be Malfoy's friend. So far, he had just listened to him pour out his woes.

"One of the memories I saw was of you, as a child, locked in a cupboard and sick," Snape said, his voice softer than Harry thought it should be for him to hear it so clearly. "With a bucket of feces nearby. Did that happen often?"

Harry shook his head. "I didn't get sick often."

Snape's sigh blew out his nostrils. "I meant, being locked in the cupboard."

"Then you should have been clearer," Harry retorted.

Snape rubbed his temple as if he were developing a headache. Well, good, Harry thought. The least he could do was return blow for blow, and Snape was making _him_ feel as if he had something pressed down the middle of his spine.

"Why the cupboard?" Snape persisted. "The house I saw had plenty of room to put you elsewhere, perhaps places where they wouldn't have to hear or smell you."

Harry nodded. "I know. But no place that was as convenient for me to sleep. That was my bedroom for a long time."

Snape stared at him. "Someone should have known," he said. "Someone _would _have known. How did the Dursleys explain your presence in the cupboard to friends of theirs that came to visit?"

Harry rolled his eyes. "How were their friends supposed to know about it, if I was in school when they came, or if I stayed in the cupboard and was quiet? Besides, their neighbors who gossiped with Aunt Petunia all thought I was a troublemaker. They probably still think I went to a school for criminal boys instead of Hogwarts."

"It is true that trouble finds you," Snape said.

Harry gave him a grin he knew was cheerfully vicious, because he'd used it before and Hermione had told him so. Snape blinked and stared at him, taken aback. Harry shook his head at him. It was kind of fun, sparring with Snape like this. He knew nothing about Harry, and so Harry could chase him easily away from the things that might be the most painful, while still telling the truth.

All this _was _truth. Something he'd told Ron and Hermione multiple times during the war, when they heard some of his babbling and his nightmares and it was hard to have secrets from anyone. He'd learned how to tell it with a hard kernel of truth wrapped inside a softer layer, his consideration for them. Snape didn't deserve the softer layer, that was all.

"Yeah," Harry said. "They didn't have any trouble believing it, either."

"Did you remain in the cupboard your entire childhood?" Snape demanded, eyeing him.

Harry shrugged. "Yeah, pretty much. They put me in the second bedroom once I started going to Hogwarts."

Snape blinked again, then said, "You were still a child at that time. Therefore, the cupboard did _not _last for your entire childhood."

Harry showed his teeth at him. "Fine, pedant, have it your way. But it doesn't convince me that you're on my side when you sound like you'd rather agree with the Dursleys, y'know, or that you're finding some way to excuse them."

* * *

_Why in the world does every conversation with Potter degenerate so quickly? _

Well, perhaps the last one had not. But Severus knew even that was only in the form of him having scored some points off Potter, while in this conversation it had turned. In terms of actually _helping _Potter, this was not working.

He shook his head, and made another try, from a different direction. "I also saw some of your memories of the war and how it affected you."

Potter nodded. "Hard not to, when they're the ones that damaged my mind enough to raise up those barriers against Legilimency." He didn't sound much bothered by it.

Severus stared hard at him again. "Do you _understand_ what I am saying? The experiences you went through during the war were horrific. I was troubled by the memories I saw, and I am not easily rattled."

Potter rolled his eyes. "Harder than what you went through? Harder than what hit my friends, or what hit Draco? I don't think so."

"It was in two ways," Severus said, and found that speaking about this as if it were the potions instructions he was giving to an apprentice helped calm his nerves. He still paused before he went on, however, to choose the right words. "First, you experienced much more of the same occurrences. Draco and I went through torture, yes, and he endured the death of his parents, as I—as I did not." There was no way he would confess to Potter about what he had felt when he killed Albus. "And your friends went behind you, but they did not experience everything you suffered, either."

"But it was enough." Potter wrapped his arms around himself, then seemed to realize it could be read as a defensive gesture and dropped them, staring at Severus as if daring him to comment on it. "Anything that happened to them was too much."

"But you agree that you might have more trauma than they do?" Severus had recovered his balance again—until the next time Potter said or did something that threw him off it, at least—and he was curious to see how Potter would respond to the question.

"What's trauma?" Potter shrugged. "The nightmares, the way the memories rose up in my mind as a barrier, the way that I sometimes want to die? Ron and Hermione experienced all of those at one point."

Severus sighed. It was obvious that he wasn't about to get Potter to admit to the sheer number of incidents, or that he might have suffered more than someone else. It was not in the boy's nature to admit that, at least not right now. "The second thing that distinguishes your experiences from others' is simply that too much depended on you. Draco was desperate to save his parents. That was his obligation during your sixth year, and I suspect you saw the way it destroyed him." He held Potter's eyes until he nodded. "But once they were dead, that source of stress, at least, was gone, and replaced by grief. You held yourself responsible for killing the Dark Lord, for ridding the world of him. You were not free until he was dead."

"Then that means it can't be stressing me now," Potter countered instantly. "If you're right and Draco's stress ended the minute his parents died—which I don't believe for an instant—then the same thing might have happened to me."

"But you are left with the memories," Severus said. "Draco, at least, had me."

Potter snorted. "I don't think much of the way you must have comforted him, considering what he's like now, if you'll pardon me saying so, _sir_," he said, with a sneer. "And my friends talked to me about my burdens."

"Did you ever respond?" Severus leaned forwards. "Or did they confess what had happened to them and their anxieties about it, and you held back?"

Potter hesitated. Frowned.

"Yes, exactly," Severus said. He grimaced. Saying the next words would be as pleasant as biting into a lemon, but it must be done. "I—did not do the best job with Draco. I did not always comfort him in the ways I should have. But I was there for him, and it shows. You still have unhealed wounds that no one else has ever treated."

Potter leaned in aggressively, until his face was closer to Severus's than it had been so far in any conversation. "Don't you dare blame my friends. If there's anyone to blame for that, it was me. I held them away. I kept them from coming close."

Severus nodded. "I _do _fault the right person, Potter, never fear." He watched the boy's eyes grow bright with indignation, and sighed. "Understand. I am now the person who must try to give you some of the healing you denied."

Potter snorted again. "And you think that when I wouldn't let my friends get close enough, I would let _you_?"

"I am not your friend," Severus said. _Yet_. Yet he was more than Potter's captor, as well. He put aside the effort to name what was between them until later. "If you permit me near, then at least you know that I will not be hurt by what I discover there. And I never held you up to be a hero, as Granger and Weasley did. I will not be disappointed by the idea that you suffered so much."

"Unless you think you should have inflicted the suffering yourself."

Severus shook his head. "I am past any desire to cause you deliberate pain, Potter, although it may happen anyway. I am not the professor who tormented you in idle hours at Hogwarts. If you are to live here and be what Draco wants you to be and what the hostage situation needs you to be—which I know is the only reason you agreed to do this in the first place—I cannot act the same way I did in the past."

* * *

Harry relaxed. It was inexplicably important to him that Snape not act like he was Harry's friend or something, and it sounded like he wouldn't. And then there was the fact that he'd admitted wanting to help Harry because of Draco.

_We're united in shared concern for him, anyway. And if he can depend more on Snape, then he can depend less on me, and there's more chance that I'll get to leave._

"Fine," he said. "What about if I start out with a few memories, and you say what you think of them, and we can see whether we even agree?"

Snape studied him with that impassive face Harry hated for a little while. He hated not knowing what people were thinking, especially when they expected you to _guess _and punished you when you got in the way or did the wrong thing. _Like Uncle Vernon._

At last, though, Snape dipped his head in a gesture that might have been a muted nod.

That left Harry with the task of choosing which memories he wanted to start with, of course. He hesitated for a little while, then shook his head. He was making this harder than it needed to be, really. He would just go with the simplest ones, the ones that he had already partially admitted to Snape or Snape had already seen, and see what happened from there.

"All right," he said. "So they kept me in a cupboard. It was for a long time. I don't think they were doing it when I was still a baby, but it wasn't long after that."

"You were a year and a half old when you came to live with them?" Snape sounded like someone asking how long it would take a potion to brew—if he ever did that, Harry added in the privacy of his head. He probably knew all the brewing times of all the potions he started, because he was creepily organized like that.

Harry nodded. "So they didn't do it at first, but it was the first bedroom I can remember."

Snape nodded back. "They had a big enough house that they could have given you your own room?"

Harry shrugged. "Sure. But the bedroom where they put me was a dumping room for Dudley's toys instead, the ones he broke or didn't want anymore."

"Dudley being your cousin."

"Yes." Harry peered at Snape, but he hadn't altered a line in his face or moved an inch. It seemed that he was taking this only as seriously as Harry was in telling it. Right. That was good. Harry swallowed back his uneasiness. "So. I did have a room, but not until after I was ready to go to Hogwarts. And they only did it then because they were afraid someone was watching them, I think."

"Why?" Snape tilted his head, and his hair fell across one eye. He seemed in no hurry to clear it off. "Surely they had known about the wizarding world from the day you were placed on their doorstep, if not earlier."

"Because the Hogwarts letters I got were addressed to my cupboard," Harry said. "They thought someone _knew_." But no one had known, and he had gradually stopped expecting them to, when no one said anything to him.

"It is a magical quill that addresses the letters," Snape said softly. "Not a person. You realized that?"

Harry nodded.

Snape paused as if waiting for him to go on, and then delicately prodded, "They ignored you when you were sick?"

"Oh, as much as possible the rest of the time, too," Harry said, grateful to have his next subject picked for him. "They liked to tell me to go to the cupboard and pretend I didn't exist. But sometimes I had to be out to go to school and do the chores. They didn't talk to me much then, either, except when I broke something."

"They did not touch you."

Harry sneered, and shook his head. This was the part he had known Snape would come to sooner or later, and the feeling of being able to disappoint him was—wonderful. More wonderful than Harry had known a sensation could be, really. "No. They didn't beat me, they didn't rape me, they didn't hold me down or burn me or kick me or punch me or slap me or whatever else you're thinking. Once or twice they threw things at me, and my cousin bullied me. But he did that to everyone, like all the kids at primary school who tried to be friends with me. That's what was normal. Nothing new there."

Snape cocked his head. "Because you were not beaten or raped," he said, "you think you were not abused."

Harry shrugged impatiently. "No, I know all about different kinds of abuse. Hermione made sure I did." Hermione had coped with her own fear and pain during the war by giving them lectures on all sorts of things, and psychological lectures hadn't been the rarest. "Emotional abuse, that's what it was. Verbal, maybe. They called me a freak and said my parents were drunkards who deserved to die, because I think that was the worst thing they could think of without telling me about magic—"

"You did not know your own kind, then," Snape said. "Or have visions of a world where you could fit in."

Again, Harry had to shrug. "I had the fantasies all the kids do when their parents are mean, you know? That my parents were rich and powerful and important people, and that someday they would come and take me away. I think I'm the only person I know whose fantasies even came close to coming true."

Snape frowned a little. "What did you know about your parents before you came to Hogwarts?"

"Their names, and that they died in a car crash," Harry said. He took a soft, bitter pleasure in being able to surprise Snape with this. "My aunt and uncle also claimed that I got the scar from the accident. That was it."

"You did not know—what they looked like." Snape sounded as if he was forcing the words through a tight throat.

Harry snorted. "Nope. Everyone was happy enough to tell me that I had my dad's face and my mum's eyes when I got to school, though."

Snape spent what seemed like an endless amount of time studying him. Harry stared straight back. _Take that and choke on it, bastard. No, I had no idea what my dad did to you, or that I looked like him, and that was the reason I didn't understand why you started yelling at me and bullying me. That's the end of any hope you might have had that I was deliberately misunderstanding you and acting like him, huh?_

* * *

_No wonder he latched on so strongly to certain…aspects of the wizarding world. The Headmaster must have been the closest thing to a grandfather he had ever known. And the professors who made rules were only more adults like his aunt and uncle, who demanded things of him that seemed strange and which he had no idea how to fulfill._

That, though, was not an excuse for some of the things Potter had done, and it was not an excuse for his earlier failure to speak about his childhood. If he had talked to Albus like this, then Severus was sure that he would have been rescued.

_But you know the reasons he had for not doing it. Did you ever spend time talking to anyone about how much Lily hurt you? Albus inferred it, he did not speak of it._

Severus shook his head and continued his questions. "I do not remember you asking questions in school."

Potter gave him a bitter smile, too bitter for one so young to know. "The Dursleys taught me pretty well not to ask questions. So I gave it up. And no one really volunteered the information, either, except when they wanted to tell me how much like one of my parents I was. I didn't know what subjects my parents were good in or what they liked to do or what their families were like unless someone told me. I _still _have no idea what my grandparents were like, because it seems that no one knew them." He shrugged. "That's why I have a limited amount of sympathy for Malfoy when he wails about how hard his life is. He lost his family, but at least he had them, and he grew up with people who loved him."

Severus was tempted to say that Lucius's love was sometimes a harder burden for his son to bear than any amount of ignoring would have been, but he would not allow this conversation to drift off into one about Draco. Potter was a master at deflection, and most of the time, he didn't even seem to realize he had done it. Severus therefore waited a beat, until Potter had slumped back into his chair and seemed to have given up his idea of making Severus talk about Draco, and then said, "You did not attempt to learn more about wizarding history and how your family fit into it when you arrived in our world?"

Potter gave him a strange look. "Of course I did. Hagrid told me about my parents and how they died defending me from Voldemort first thing."

Severus shook his head. "I phrased that badly. Potter history. The history of prejudice against Muggleborns."

"Yeah, you try to do that when unfamiliar school subjects are poured on your head and a teacher hates you for _no good reason _and you're trying to survive attacks by a deranged maniac," Potter muttered. "It was no good. Even if I wanted to ask questions, there's no guarantee that they would have answered me. Dumbledore kept everything as close as he could. People weren't lining up to volunteer the information. They probably thought Aunt Petunia told me everything."

"I would have—"

"Yeah, yeah, you would have done everything differently, and you would have survived and saved the day and learned everything about your family that you wanted to and recovered from abuse like _that_," Potter interrupted. "You're _not me_. I was just grateful to have friends who didn't turn on me and who wanted to investigate mysteries with me. I never had that before. Never had regular meals before, or encouragement to do the kinds of bloody freakish things the Dursleys hated. I'm just glad I knew a little bit about the Houses before I got to Hogwarts, or I might not have had any of those things."

"Explain what you mean," Severus said, and he did not care that his tone had gone colder than he wanted it to, his body more rigid. It sounded as though Potter was about to begin another anti-Slytherin rant, and Severus had already heard enough of those to last him a lifetime.

"I mean," Potter said, glaring at him, "that Hagrid and Ron had both told me about Slytherin being the place for bullies and Dark wizards. Well, I wasn't going to join a House that was full of the kind of people who were like my cousin or who killed my parents, was I? And the Hat wanted to put me there, so—"

"You are lying," Severus said, and thought he controlled his voice, except he knew from the way it twitched that he had not. Potter noted the twitch, too, and leaned forwards as though, by close study, he could force Severus to yield his secrets. "The Hat makes the decisions. Had it wanted Slytherin for you, that is where you would have gone."

Potter snorted. "Not you, too. When I first told Ron about this, then he freaked out, too. But no, it listens to what you decide." He stared into the distance and shook his head a little. "It told me I could go anywhere, but it pushed Slytherin. I wanted to be in Gryffindor because Ron knew he was going to be there, and he was the first friend I ever had. So the Hat warned me and argued with me a bit, and then it sent me there."

Severus did not know what to say. That was a rare enough occurrence that he sat there in silence for a short time, trying to recover his balance. Potter sat still, too, glancing at him with a mocking expression on his face that made Severus's teeth grind. Potter need not think he was so special and important that it was his words alone which made Severus grope for words.

The annoyance brought speech back to him again. "It would, of course, have been terrible to be a Slytherin," he whispered. "The friendships you would have found there would not have been to your liking, and you would always have been yearning after Gryffindor."

"Oh, no," Potter said in a bright, brittle tone. "I would have had a wonderful time, I'm sure, with a Head of House who hated me, and Malfoy who I'd annoyed on the train, and kids who'd despise me for defeating the Dark Lord or because my mother was Muggleborn. Yes, I should have known _when I was eleven _that not everything in the world was black and white, even though the only people I'd met in the wizarding world had just finished telling me it was. They just had different viewpoints on what was good, that's all. Malfoy wanted me to pick him and Slytherin and get rid of Ron. Ron wasn't any better, but he wasn't worse, either. And I had a good life in Gryffindor. The best." His glance, this time, was scathing and scraping. "Can't say I regret it, either, when I haven't managed to get along with the two Slytherins I'm living with now."

_I am still older than he is. I am the one who knows what the House is like from the inside, the one who knows history he never learned._

_ That he never learned._

Severus closed his eyes and leaned back in his chair. He had to find the right words, and he searched for them for a long time before he found them.

"That you would make such choices, given your background, is not surprising. And I might have been more sympathetic, and more able to help you, had I known your background."

"It wouldn't have mattered," Potter countered in a heartbeat. "You would have sneered at me, and asked if I wanted help recovering from my abuse, and did I know that you suffered worse? It doesn't _matter _to you. I get that. But I wish you would stop acting as if you cared."

"I did not care, then," Severus admitted, opening his eyes. "You were Lily's son, and the sacrifice we needed, and nothing more—not a human being with emotions I was not aware of. But I care now."

"Because of what you saw in my mind?" Potter challenged him, all bright eyes and sharp teeth. He reminded Severus of a wolf, of a fox, of himself in his schooldays. "Or because you're afraid that I'll take Draco and the Ashborn away from you?"

"Because of the former."

Potter pulled up as though someone had tugged on a bridle around his head, staring at Severus.

This was the part that made him feel old. "I have to change my mind," Severus said, and it was easier to tell the fireplace than Potter—easier, but not doable. He had to keep his gaze on that small pale face, on those brilliant green eyes that so echoed Lily's, on the way Potter froze in his seat and stared at him. "I have to acknowledge that you were abused, and that you are a stronger and better person than I knew. A person who might make a better friend to Draco than I could, since I fulfill a different role."

"How very fucking generous of you," Potter whispered, but his face was paler than ever, his voice smaller.

Severus nodded, because he could say nothing else. "I hope you will come to see it so. There is little that I can give you to make up for the way I treated you at Hogwarts, although I can try to help you here. But I will say—"

The words made him want to spit. He had to gather even more strength before he could say them. But when he did, he had to admit there was a certain relief to it, like spitting out the seed of a burning lemon.

"I am sorry for what I did."

* * *

Harry clenched his hands on either side of the chair so he wouldn't bolt. He wanted—he wanted to punch Snape's teeth in, and run, and scream at him that this was too little, too late, and laugh.

But the expression of torment on Snape's face was its own reward, in a way. He had not wanted to say those words, which meant they were less likely to be some kind of ploy to make Harry forgive him.

_And why would he want my forgiveness, anyway? Most of the time at Hogwarts, he thought he was in the right._

Harry scrubbed his hand across his scar, a remnant of the time when it still hurt. It seemed strange to him that Snape wanted anything from him at all, except to shut up and leave him alone. But he had acted as if he did, and Snape had never been _that _good an actor in front of Harry, the way he probably was in front of Voldemort; he just despised Harry too much. His mask hadn't broken so far, if it was a mask.

Maybe—maybe it was true that he wanted to soothe a bit of Harry's anxiety, if only to keep the Ashborn intact. He could have decided an apology was the best way to do that, whether or not he meant it, but simply saying the words had proved painful enough for him. He had to have some incentive.

And apparently that was Harry.

Harry stared at Snape again. Snape looked back at him with an expression of indigestion. It reminded Harry of the time Uncle Vernon had to acknowledge Dudley and not Harry had broken the dishes, because he'd come around the corner in time to catch Dudley tossing a plate on the floor.

He had still blamed Harry for making Dudley do it, of course, but Snape showed no sign of something similar. The silence stretched.

"Fine," Harry said. "Apology accepted." He stood up and walked to the lab door. Snape didn't call him back, but remained on his chair, watching Harry go.

Harry turned around on the threshold, added because it felt like a hook was buried in his guts, "I'm sorry for looking in your Pensieve during fifth year," and then bolted out.

_Thank God that's over, _he told himself as he ran. _Thank God._

_ And hopefully that'll be the end of it. Snape's calmed me down enough for him. _

_ Surely he has. Surely._


	18. Serpensortia

Thank you again for all the reviews!

_Chapter Eighteen—Serpensortia_

"Harry, they accepted it!"

For a second, as he stepped back from the hug Ron had given him, Harry was still too busy with the sight and sound of his friends to know what Hermione was talking about. Then he swore in wonder and stared at her. "They did? They really did?"

Hermione nodded, her cheeks so flushed and her eyes so bright that Harry was at last sure she was telling the truth and not making up good news to soothe him. "Yes. They said they'd be happy to publish my article and that they thought Severus Snape a neglected Potions master, one whose notes need to be studied more carefully." Harry hid a smile. He didn't think she'd realized that her voice had taken on more than a hint of snooty stuffiness, as if she wanted to imitate the way she imagined the Potions masters speaking. "And they said that they thought my article did him justice."

Harry bounced to his feet. They were using a table in a garden today, so at least they were outside, but he couldn't bring himself to sit still. He strode back and forth instead, running his hands through his hair and swearing softly.

"Harry? Aren't you pleased?"

Harry whirled around and grabbed Hermione by the waist, kissing her mouth so hard Ron made a protesting little sound. Then he let her go but danced around the garden, shaking his head.

"Of course I am," he told the skies and the air and the roses that grew nearby and his friends, although they really ought to know the truth, which meant they were a less important audience than anyone else. "Why wouldn't I be? They've tried, Snape and Malfoy, but they can't offer me enough. Snape thinks he's—he thinks he's talking me around." That was the closest he would get to telling them about the memories and the stupid "talks" with Snape where he seemed to think he had to play concerned father, or at least father confessor. "And Malfoy says he wants to be my friend, but he's told me about his parents and his friends abandoning him and how hard his life is with Snape and hasn't seemed interested in listening to anything _I _say. I don't want to stay here. I want to go."

Hermione reached out and took his hand, holding it fiercely. "And so you shall. Everyone's waiting for you, Harry. Us. The life you should have had." She hesitated, then lowered her voice. "Ginny."

Harry winced a little, automatically, and then sighed. He and Ginny had had plenty of choices to get married since the end of the war, and it hadn't happened. On the other hand, maybe being back with her would rekindle some sort of interest.

Maybe being with his friends would mean he could discuss his memories, too. There was no limit to the extraordinary things that would happen, the instant he was free. He would have his life back, and life contained everything else.

* * *

_That's what friendship looks like._

Draco had told himself that he wouldn't spy on Potter's meeting with his friends. First, because it would just irritate him to see Granger and Weasley again, and he was trying to be less irritable these days. And second, because it wasn't the kind of thing a good friend would do, and he was trying to be a good friend.

But he…

He had followed Potter out when he saw him leaving the fortress with a determined stride, and no guard. It was always possible Severus might have dismissed Bellatrix from attending Potter, of course, but also possible Potter had shed her somewhere, and that he was about to do something stupid.

Instead, though, he had watched Potter go into this garden and meet his friends. He had heard him laugh. He had watched him dance, and heard his words.

_I didn't think I was doing that. I didn't think Severus was doing that. _

His quick anger died when he remembered something Severus had once said to him, when they were still new to their prison cell and to being out of the Dark Lord's favor. Draco had paced up and down, ranting about the task the Dark Lord had assigned him and how impossible it was, and asking Severus why the Dark Lord had _wanted _him to fail. Surely punishing Draco's father couldn't matter that much? Surely the inside of an Azkaban cell, for months on end, had been punishment enough?

Severus had looked up at him, clever and cynical even in the middle of his exhaustion, and replied simply, "What matters is what the Dark Lord thinks, Draco. Not what is right or fair." He had hesitated as though he didn't want to destroy the last remnants of Draco's faith, then plunged ahead. "Not even what is real."

It was the same way now, Draco understood after hearing the way Potter spoke. It didn't matter how carefully Draco and Severus went about things if Potter still misinterpreted what they were doing, if they came across as odious to him. They would have to adjust, because Potter was the one they were trying to convince.

_He is our second-day Dark Lord, _Draco thought, shaking his head, and turned and left the garden before Potter could see him spying and become incensed at him. Draco had something he wanted to do, and his bedroom was the perfect place to do it in.

* * *

Harry lifted his head. He was having a terrible time sleeping that night, though of course he knew why. The excitement of hearing that Hermione's plan might _work _still thrummed through his veins. Lying down and going to sleep was so much less _exciting _than being up and about, talking with his friends, making plans for the moment he would be free.

Well. It wasn't only that. He had bobbed around in his bed, in different positions, for half-an-hour before admitting it, but it wasn't only that.

He was hearing something, something that flickered along the edges of his senses, shone and dived away again, and then returned just when he was about to give up on it and drift to sleep. He knotted his fingers in the sheets and listened. The sound was faint, without words. For a moment, he wondered if he was hearing a basilisk crawling about in the walls again.

But no, nothing that simple (or wonderful; perhaps he could have spoken to the basilisk and asked it to help him find some way out of his Vows). It was only a song, and it coiled like mist and scattered like it when he tried to focus his thoughts on it, as if his mind was a kind of sun to burn it away. He wondered for a second if it could be a siren, but he knew they weren't near enough the right kind of water for those.

It was becoming clear that he would never get to sleep, though, so Harry stood, shoved his feet into the soft shoes he kept for walking through the fortress, and started towards the door of his rooms.

When he opened it, Bellatrix was sitting in a chair outside it, asleep. Harry cast a _Muffliato_ on her and crept past her. He had noticed the Ashborn were less alert during the night, because Snape slept then and so they did, too.

_One of the faults of having your soldiers under your direct control and giving them no free will, _Harry thought smugly as he crept down the corridor.

He rounded several corners, following the song. It grew louder as he approached, but not loud enough to convince him it was coming from inside the fortress. Sure enough, when he opened a door that led towards a long fall of grass down towards a small river, the song was so clear that he felt tears start to his eyes for a moment.

_I'm not escaping, I'm not escaping, _he thought, over and over, to soothe the Unbreakable Vow as he plunged out and down the slope of grass. _I just want to see what this is, that's all._

The water rippled in front of him, a river so small Harry was surprised Snape and Malfoy could draw on it to feed the water needs of all the Ashborn. On the other hand, maybe they got the majority of their water somewhere else. He felt a faint breeze travel past him, and the stars overhead seemed to dance as if they were lights attached to the end of a high, dark branch. It was an amazing night, Harry thought, still staring at the water.

The song twisted around him.

It resembled a net, too, and Harry shook his head as the comparison came to him. He didn't think this was something that wanted to harm him, but it wouldn't hurt to be cautious. He made sure he had one hand on his wand and a defensive spell smoldering under his tongue as he came towards the edge of the river.

A small ripple ran towards him, and then drew back as if it had sensed him and he wasn't a visitor it had expected. Harry gave a harsh smile at nothing and kept his fingers relaxed and open, so that he could grip the wand and move it in any direction in an instant.

Something quivered in the middle of the water, and rose towards him. Harry nearly barked the spell, but kept it back just in time. Something about the movement of the long, slender thing suggested it was as hesitant as he was, but didn't know what his reaction would be if it touched him.

It looked like a neck, and a moment after he thought that, Harry made out on the head on the end reaching towards him. It was blunt, and the eyes that blinked above the place where the jaws divided it were transparent and dark blue, with slashes of shadow above them that looked suspiciously like eyelashes.

But other than those unusual things, he knew what he was looking at. This was a snake. A water snake, in the most literal interpretation of those words possible.

Harry felt a savage joy stir to life in his heart. He thought he knew now why no one else had heard the song. He nodded to the snake and hissed softly in Parseltongue, sure he would speak that rather than English since he was looking directly at the serpent. "What is your name?"

The snake flinched back from him. Maybe it had expected someone to be here, Harry thought, since it had come right up the minute the ripple retreated from him, but it hadn't expected someone who could speak its language.

The snake coiled back on itself, its body twisting through the air and through its own neck. The water flowed and melded without protest, Harry thought, like a series of miniature cataracts that could fall in any direction. He wondered how hard it would be to damage a snake like this. Probably pretty hard, when it had no body that you could cut or slice or blast apart.

"Who are you?" The snake had the same sort of melodic, drifting voice that had propelled the song through Harry's mind, and he resisted the urge to reach out and stroke it. Just because it was beautiful didn't mean it wasn't dangerous.

"My name is Harry Potter," Harry said, and knew from the way the snake's eyelashes—or whatever they were—shifted back and forth that his name must have come out in some strange way. He had asked several snakes what they heard when he said his name in Parseltongue, but it wasn't something any of them could talk about, or perhaps wanted to. "I heard your song, and awoke. It was a lovely song," he added encouragingly, when the snake floated back to the middle of the river and looked as if might mingle with the surface again.

"Perhaps it was," the snake said, and this time it had a burble in the back of its voice that it hadn't had before. Was it embarrassed? None of the other snakes Harry had spoken with before had shown a conception of that emotion, but then, this wasn't precisely a snake, was it? "But I do not—I did not mean to wake anyone up."

"I wasn't asleep," Harry said. "Who are you?"

The snake's neck went on coiling back and forth a few times, as though it assumed Harry would leave it alone when it did that. But Harry only waited and watched, more fascinated every time he saw the thin bands of liquid and light pass in and out of each other.

"My kind is the Water People," the snake said at last. Harry suspected his mind was translating the words into an acceptable kind of English just as the snakes heard his name as a kind of Parseltongue, but that didn't matter. He smiled and nodded, and the snake, flicking out a transparent blue tongue as if to smell his emotions, seemed reassured and continued. "I am called Inhabitant-of-the-Stream-that-Bends-around-Several-Corners."

Harry blinked a little. "Wow," he said at last. Even in Parseltongue, that was a long name, though he could only judge by how long it had taken the snake to say it. "Can I call you Bends?"

The snake cocked its head again, this time completely upside-down, and flowed through its own neck again. "I would prefer Corners," it said at last.

Harry grinned. "Why not?" He sat down on the bank, and Corners promptly floated down to his level, shortening its body by shedding several feet of dripping water. Harry studied its bright eyes and shook his head. "I don't think I've ever heard of or seen your people before."

"The Water People love the water," said Corners. "We find the places that few others come. We cannot share with the merfolk or the ones who drink so much water that they swell and swim away with it."

"What about sea serpents?" Harry asked.

Corners flicked his tongue out again, and this time the burble in the back of his voice was louder, like water flowing around a hard stone. "They only swim in the sea," he said. "They are not _of _it. Not the way we are."

Harry nodded. "What brought you here, today? If you live in the sea, then I don't think that you'd come up a stream."

Corners gave him a slow look that made Harry flush. He knew it conveyed contempt better than the hard burble in the back of his voice. "I am this stream," he said. "I wanted to come here tonight and sing. I already apologized for waking you up. I can go." He pulled back towards the middle of the stream.

"No, wait!" Harry said hastily. Corners was new, and Harry wanted to go on speaking to him because he was different than Malfoy or Snape, or even than his friends. Corners had nothing to do with Ashborn or hostages or the complexities of friendship that Snape and Malfoy claimed to have with him.

Corners paused and glanced at him. Harry nodded again. "Sorry. I didn't mean to upset you. Have you lived in the sea before, then?"

"Yes." Corners laid his chin on the edge of the stream, so Harry had to look down past his own feet to find his eyes. "It is wonderful, and wide. But there are no humans who speak to us there. Perhaps they are everywhere on land?"

Harry smiled in spite of himself. "No, I think I'm the only one." Then he hesitated, and shrugged. "There might be other people in other places," he said. "Other lands. But I killed the only other one I knew of who could do it, so they're rare."

Corners once again coiled himself around in a slow way and looked at Harry with a directness that told him he had said something stupid. "Why would you do that?" Corners demanded. "If you are rare, you should remain with and support each other."

"We couldn't," Harry said shortly. "He decided I was his enemy when I was a baby—" that probably came out "hatchling" in Parseltongue, though Harry couldn't be sure "—and tried to kill me. My parents died to save me. After that, I knew he wouldn't let me live in peace. I had to kill him."

Corners waited, head bobbing up and down in time with the little ripples of the river, as though demanding more of the story. Then he said, "Why did you not find more snakes and surround yourself with them, then? If you are lonely, then you should find those not of your own kind who can talk to you."

"I can talk to other humans," Harry corrected. As always, it seemed to him that snakes were relentlessly literal. In this case, Corners had obviously decided that he couldn't speak to anyone but other Parselmouths. "And I don't think the people I live with would like it if I brought in snakes."

"Then they shall not like me."

Harry blinked at him. "You're thinking about staying longer than you have, then?"

"I want someone to speak with," Corners said, "and the other snakes I have met are too limited in their understanding. Merfolk only wish to sing. They taught my kind long ago, it is said, but the Water People have gone beyond them." He didn't sound as if he was bragging, only as if it was an utterly inconsequential thing to have happen. "I have spoken so long with other Water People that I bear their personalities in my mind as the sunset water bears the light. I want someone to speak to," he repeated, and turned his head to the side so that he could fix both one bright blue eye and that flickering tongue on Harry. "And you are the one I have chosen."

"Er," Harry said. "Thanks. But I don't know how often I can come and speak with you. I only came out tonight because I heard the song and everyone else was asleep. And you can't leave the water to come with me, can you?"

"You have water?"

Harry entertained, for a moment, a bizarre picture of Corners trying to climb into his body through his eye fluids or something similar. Then he caught on to what he meant and nodded. "Yeah, we have water in the fortress—um, the big building near here," he added, because Corners's tongue had stopped flicking out and he looked blank. "But we don't have a running stream of it."

"There are containers that can hold water," Corners said thoughtfully. "I leaped into one once on a human water snake, and the man who raised it to his lips saw me and shouted and dashed me back."

"And you still want to speak with humans?" Harry asked, impressed despite himself. "That's pretty tolerant."

Corners gave him yet another patient look. "I want to speak with _you_," he said. "With someone who can speak back to me, and has shown themselves willing to do that with me. That is the difference between you and the rest of them."

"Er—right," Harry said. He had the impression Corners was going to be more trouble than he'd thought. "But you can really fit in a cup?"

"The small round thing? Yes." Corners lowered his head so that the end of his neck dissolved into the water and only his head floated on the top, like some strange Muggle pool toy. "Bring one to me."

"Right," Harry said again, and stood up and took a step away from the bank of the stream, looking over his shoulder. Corners waited for him, those giant blue eyes patient under the shadows that edged them, and Harry shook his head and raced for the fortress, determined to find a cup and come back before Corners changed his mind.

He had a cup left from his dinner tray. Harry spared a moment to wonder why in the world Snape still didn't let him eat with the other Ashborn in the dining hall, and then shrugged. He probably wouldn't want to eat with them. All those blank and staring faces would put him off his appetite, which never needed encouragement to be small, anyway.

When he got back to the bank of the stream, Corners was still waiting. He lifted his head when he saw Harry, and those eyes this time had a glint of what looked like satisfaction. Harry wondered if he should be attributing human emotions to one of the Water People, but he thought it was harmless. So far, Corners had acted and reacted as if he had them. It was probably no worse than shortening his name or the strange things that Harry knew must sometimes result when he tried to translate human concepts into Parseltongue.

He stood there and let Corners sniff the inside of the cup first, to make sure it didn't contain anything that would offend him. Harry found himself wondering, as he watched the tongue dart and shoot past him like a blue shadow, what would happen if one of the Water People passed across a drop of tea or some other liquid. Did they absorb it? Did it become a part of their bodies, or could they just coil themselves up into pure water and shed anything else they didn't like? Harry thought it was probably that last one, because Corners hadn't had trouble so far changing the length of his neck or the look of his face when he wanted to. Even his eyes seemed to brighten and darken in accordance with laws Harry didn't understand, like the course of the ripples that passed across the stream.

"It is well," Corners said, and then reared high. Harry fell back a step as he looked at that enormous neck stretching up to the sky, the head just a minute blob on the end of it, and winced as he imagined it crashing into him. He knew that people could die falling into water from a great enough height. If the water decided to dive on _you_ and hit you instead—

The neck came down, the head narrowed to a pinpoint. Harry stood firm and held the cup up. Malfoy wouldn't have had the courage to do this, he thought. Nor Snape. This was another thing that made him different from them, like the Parseltongue, that reminded him he had other options.

The force of Corners's dive, when it touched the cup, was much softer than Harry had expected. He draped and flowed into the cup, and it only rocked gently as though Harry had set it in a strong breeze. He braced both hands, and soon the cup was full of rippling, slightly mucky river water. Harry lowered the cup and stared into it.

A much smaller version of the blue eyes reappeared, and only the eyes, gleaming near the surface like slightly thickened bubbles. "Take me with you," Corners said. "And bring me back to the river sometimes, that I might join with the water and renew myself."

Still struggling against his own astonishment, Harry nodded and carried the cup carefully inside, already planning the ways he would conceal it. He didn't want to spill it, of course, and introducing Malfoy and Snape to Corners was out of the question.

Or, at least, he thought it was, until a wand-light blazed suddenly from ahead of him and Malfoy's voice said, "And where did _you_ go?"

* * *

It wasn't until he caught Potter in the glare of his wand that Draco thought about what he would do if Potter managed to sneak off, somehow not disturbing the Unbreakable Vows.

And his first thought was panic.

Not because Potter might die. Not because it might end the agreement between the Ashborn and Potter's people, and begin a new war. But because he would lose the one person he felt was trying hardest at the moment to understand him, even harder than Severus.

And—that meant he needed to change some things, if he really felt that strongly.

Of course, he greeted Potter with a sneer, because showing that panic would have meant that Potter despised him. Draco knew how _this _went. Potter ignored Draco, and Draco fought for notice, and he showed too much honesty, and Potter struck him down and turned his back on him again. Draco saw no need to expose as much of himself as Potter wanted him to, because Potter laughed when he did.

But Potter barely glanced up from the glass of water he was holding to blink at Draco, and panic surged in the center of Draco's chest again. That was the kind of glance he might have given Draco at Hogwarts, when they were still enemies and Draco could only really get his attention by insulting his friends or his parents. He had found something else, something that enchanted him and would draw his opinion.

Draco stepped forwards. He meant nothing more than to pull Potter's attention back to himself, and perhaps ask a few necessary questions. That was it. That was all.

But the water in the glass bubbled as if Potter was using it for tea first, and a head poked out of it. The head was long and slender, graceful, shaped here and there like a horse's. It reared up against the ceiling, and then went on growing, until just a thin tendril of water remained in the cup Potter was holding to support it. The great snake, balanced impossibly on that tiny column, looked down at Draco and hissed.

It had expressive, human eyes, Draco saw, and he flinched from the cutting contempt in them, whether or not Potter had inspired it.

Potter listened to the snake with an odd smile, then said to Draco, "This is one of the Water People, who's agreed to let me call him Corners. He wants to stay with me for a while, since he'd never met a Parselmouth before. And I don't think he's impressed that you want to bar my way."

Draco tightened his fingers around his wand. His mouth babbled away before he could convince his mind to work with it. "One of the Water People? The sea serpents? They're dangerous, and you can't keep one indoors, they won't get enough connection with the sea, and that can be dangerous for them—"

Potter hissed at the snake, who hissed back briefly and glared at Draco again. Potter rolled his eyes. "The Water People aren't sea serpents," he said. "They're different from them. They're made of water, and they can take any form they want." He shrugged. "He was the one who said he could fit into a cup—although he didn't know the name—and live indoors with me for a while. I'm sure he would know if it was dangerous for him to be cut off from the river. It doesn't seem like it."

"Where did you get him?" Draco couldn't help the envious tone in his voice. He never had been able to, not when it came to Potter.

Potter relaxed and grinned at him. "I heard him singing. He seemed startled that anyone could, but I probably only heard it in the first place because it was in Parseltongue."

"Can he sing to me?" Draco didn't know why he made the request, other than a desire to keep Potter standing there and talking, but perhaps it had been the right thing to do. Potter drew back a little, blinked, and then hissed at the snake.

Corners—though it was hard to think of him like that when he was all curves and no corners that Draco could see—turned his head back and forth as though checking the height of the ceiling or the openness of the walls. Then he began to make a sloshing noise that Draco found it hard to distinguish from the sloshing of water against the sides of the cup itself. He wondered how in the world it had woken Potter up and drawn him outside. Perhaps it had been louder when Corners was in the river.

And yet, the more he listened, the more Draco could hear the melody. It was thin and had no pattern, but that hardly seemed to matter. The more it wandered, the longer he wanted to hear it, to try and predict the twists it would take.

He drew a step closer to the cup. Potter shifted, as if he thought he might have to guard the snake from Draco, and then stood still and let him sing. The song whispered to an end at last, and Corners swayed back and forth, the ripple of the water this time making a sound that Draco reckoned was his version of applause.

He took a deep breath and stepped back to his original position. "Will you try to bring the Water People into the alliance?" he asked Potter.

Potter's scorn was instantly back on his face again, cutting into every feature and hardening it in a way Draco hated. One thing he had learned about having Potter as a friend, at least: there were certain expressions he could stand to see less of.

"Why would I want to do that, when this alliance wasn't my idea?" Potter asked shortly. "I'll be gone soon, and that means you won't even have my help with the centaurs anymore. I should wean you of it while I still can, so that you aren't stuck trying to cope with them and their demands alone one day without any practice beforehand."

"This is your alliance, too," Draco said, and made sure he was keeping his hand away from his wand. "You were the one who welcomed the centaurs, and the only one who fed them at first, and the one who—"

"No one in the bloody alliance has any responsibility _to me_," Potter said. "I told you that once before. And since you said we should be friends, you've done nothing but cry on my shoulder."

"Because you won't bloody _open up to me!_" Draco snapped, Potter's words lancing a wound he hadn't suspected existed. "Severus is the one who gets you to talk, but you won't confess any of the details of your life to me! Even though I was the one who helped you save that life when the vampire came back in your head!"

Potter's breath rattled and gasped in his throat for a moment. Then he pushed calm onto his face and shook his head. His Water Snake was swaying above him, but he didn't seem inclined to pay attention to it, instead only staring at Draco. Draco felt his skin prickle as though someone was stroking his hair. It was negative attention, but at least it was _attention_.

He'd always starved for that from Potter. Always. Even when they hated each other, every day he'd been near Potter except a few months in sixth year, he had always wanted something from him.

That made him more than a little sick and obsessed, Draco reckoned, but he had the right to be like that anyway, after the way his parents had died and he had survived the Dark Lord's tortures. At least he no longer followed Severus about, breathless for the same kind of attention.

And if Potter left, he would just have to deal with the lack of it from him, too.

That thought helped Draco steady himself, where he had felt like a rock that had lost ground in a flood. He heaved out a breath and said, "I'm sorry, Potter. There are things friends do for each other besides tell each other their life stories, and I concede I haven't done them for you. Not in a long time."

"Oh, you _concede_, do you?" Potter's scorn stung at him. "How big of you. How about you've never done it for me, and I don't want you to start?"

Draco clenched his teeth down, and thought of the cat automaton waiting in his rooms for him. He could go to it, and give it commands, and it would obey them. It would pay attention to him and care for him as no one else did, not Severus and not Potter.

But—

That wasn't what he wanted. He wanted attention from a person who could choose to give it to him, or withhold it. He valued the gift of the cat from Severus, but he would value Potter more if he chose to be his friend, Draco couldn't deny that.

"I'll leave, if you want me to," he said. "I won't press you to stay anymore, or to be part of the alliance, either."

Potter stopped. His breath, his blinking, the motions of his slender hands, all of them paused. Draco tensed, and waited for the blast of spells that would probably follow the moment when he had managed to startle the Chosen One.

Then Potter whispered, "What? Why?"

"Because—" Draco grimaced. He'd tasted food in the Dark Lord's dungeons that was sweeter than this admission he had to make. "Because you're right. I pressed you to be my friend, guilted you into it, and then it turned out I had nothing to really offer you besides that. You were concerned about me being used by Severus, but that's not the same thing as friendship, and I made believe that it was."

"Why, though?" Potter said, and took such a violent step he nearly spilled the water that held the snake. It hissed, but Potter, beyond twitching a little, paid no attention to the sound. "Why in the world would you _care _if it turned out I didn't feel anything but pity for you? Why does it matter?"

Draco licked his lips. Nothing for it, it seemed.

"Because I want your regard," he said. "You were the first one who refused me a favor."

Potter snorted. "But plenty of people have done it since then. Snape, Dumbledore, Vol—Old Snake-Face—"

"You never forget your first," Draco said, and paused to enjoy the odd feeling in his throat for a moment before he went on. Part of that odd feeling came from the way that Harry had avoided the Dark Lord's name even though his promise to Draco to do so might be null and void by now. "And sometimes you have to stop questioning why you want what you want. I wanted Severus to pay more attention to me, and then I wanted you. But that's not the same thing as actually giving you things that would make you want my attention in return, or care about me. So." He discovered his hands had become tight fists, and uncoiled them again with a wrench. "I'm sorry. I'll learn to handle the alliance on my own. The only thing I ask is that you tell me when you're leaving, and maybe explain to the centaurs why you're going, if they ask."

"This can't be it, Malfoy." Potter drew back on himself like the snake. "It can't be that simple. You can't—it's _insane _that you would chase me so far and then draw back at the last minute. This is some new plan to make me chase after you in return and then fall into friendship with you, isn't it?"

Draco snorted in return. "It would be brilliant if I could pull that off, but I don't think I can." He waved a hand up and down in front of him. He felt thin and stretched and old, and his throat was full, now, of some liquid he hoped very much wasn't tears. "I'm less smart than I thought I was, less practiced, less Slytherin, less clever. I came up with the idea of renewing the pure-blood alliance, and even of marrying a girl from one of the families that still practice those old ways, but I've been pants at pursuing it. I make promises and I break them. Well, I'm going to keep this one. Good-bye, Potter. Only come and talk to me if you want to, and talk to the centaurs."

And he forced himself to turn and walk away.

Potter didn't call after him. Draco unclenched his jaw a moment later and admitted that, while it would have been gratifying if that had happened, he didn't really expect it to.

_So much for that. Now I have to learn how to run the alliance on my own and figure out how to negotiate with the werewolves on my own, too. _He and Potter had never had a detailed conversation about what he should do there, because every time they spoke Draco seemed to end up complaining about his past instead.

_If he ends up as my friend, then it'll be because he wants to, not because I tried to force him to be._

His muscles relaxed, one by one, once he was in his rooms and had lain down on the bed. He was sure this was the right decision, much as it hurt to think of Potter leaving. Potter had helped him get back some of his sense of self-respect, and Severus's gift had proven that Severus still valued Draco, which was a boost to his self-respect, too, but he had to take the final steps on his own.

He closed his eyes, and, while he still felt good and had some ideas about what to do with it bubbling at the forefront of his mind, dreamed himself towards the Forbidden Forest, concentrating on the image of Laughter.


	19. Power Shifts

Thank you again for all the reviews!

_Chapter Nineteen—Power Shifts_

"I did not know you had allied with one of the Water People."

Harry rolled his eyes. He'd carried Corners's cup with him into the garden where the centaurs were staying because Corners wanted to see all of the fortress Harry was familiar with, and it didn't seem polite to leave him behind. He should have reckoned that the centaurs would immediately see him as a new ally, though, or else not see any value in him at all.

"I haven't allied with him," he said, keeping his voice clipped but not unfriendly. He didn't want to annoy Kleianthe and make Malfoy's task harder after he had left. For all that he couldn't care much about the alliance, Malfoy did, and Harry wasn't such an arsehole as to try and damage it for him. "He woke me with his song and then decided to stay. That's different, and you know it."

"Is it?" Kleianthe gave him a small smile and turned away to eat the apple Harry had brought her as a peace offering that morning. She didn't like anyone to see the way the juice ran from the corners of her mouth, or something, Harry thought.

"Yes," Harry said to her back, and then turned to Thera. Sometimes she had been more sympathetic than Kleianthe, although she _was _the one who had insisted he had to stay in the alliance for the sake of hypothetical future people who might never show up at all. "Don't you think I can make friends who aren't allies?"

"It depends on the way you define allies," Thera said. She swished her tail and looked thoughtfully at Corners, who was currently the size of a cobra and swaying above the cup while he stared into the corners of the garden. The sight of so many trees and flowers, so much solid earth, seemed to stun him. "Someone who is friendly with you, who aids you, or would aid you, if you asked? That's my definition."

"Yeah," Harry said, unable to keep the bitterness out of his voice. "But there's no place in a definition like that for someone who doesn't _want _to relate to people like that."

"You wish not to be friendly with them?" Thera took a step towards him, then stopped when Corners glanced at her. "I did not understand your personality that way, based on the things you have said and done."

"Argh," Harry said, the first time in his life he'd made the noise as a word, and clutched one hand to his hair. The other still held the cup, so he couldn't move it much. Corners touched the edge of his long blue tongue to Harry's hair anyway and glared at Thera, as if he assumed she was the one who caused the most distress to Harry. Well, in a way she had been. "My friends give me support, too. We enjoy ourselves. We have arguments. We don't consider ourselves as irrevocably bound to everyone else, either. There are a few people Hermione likes that I can't stand. But apparently I would have to help raise your children, and give aid to the werewolves, and agree with the vampires' friends—if we ever bring them into the alliance—and somehow negotiate between you and the merfolk when you're both jealous of your honor, and leave the Ashborn under Snape's control, because if he's my ally I can hardly challenge his possession of them, can I? There's nothing for _me_ in all this."

"If you are trapped, it leaves no time to sing or slip down to the water," Corners murmured in a voice that had the pattern of the song he had sung to Malfoy in it. Harry wasn't sure how he could tell the difference between that music and the original melody that had woken him from sleep, but sometimes he thought he had acquired a new kind of ear since listening to Corners. "No freedom."

Harry nodded to him, then wished he hadn't when the cup sloshed. No drops fell to the ground, though. Corners could control the water he was made of, Harry reminded himself; what he held really wasn't a tiny portion of the river, but Corners's body. "Exactly."

Thera stamped a hoof in thought for a moment, staring past Harry with an expression that was not quite a scowl. Then she inclined her head and murmured, "I wish I had known you felt that way."

"You should have," Harry couldn't help muttering. Then he sighed. _Don't ruin it for Draco, right. _"But why should you have to think about that? I want to leave, and I know you don't feel obligations to people who don't feel obligations to you."

Thera shook her head. "Of course other people in the alliance will aid you," she said. "If I did not make that clear, I am sorry."

"That's the problem," Harry said. Corners flicked a wet tongue against his ear, and he tried not to jump. It would undercut the impression of calm adulthood he was trying to present to Thera more than a little. "I don't want anything they can offer me. The best thing they could give me would be going away and leaving me alone."

Thera reached out and placed a slender hand on his shoulder. Harry stared. He never remembered her touching him before. Corners hissed, a trace of a new warble in the back of his voice.

"No one is ever alone in this world," Thera said quietly. "One cannot avoid making connections."

"But the connections I have now are enough for me," Harry said, when he had breathed once through his nose and once through his mouth in an effort not to shout. "I want to be with my friends, not make new ones." He repeated that to Corners, whom he saw gazing at him for a translation.

"You made me," Corners said, and swayed back from him.

"That's different," Harry said, turning to face him and reaching out so his fingers hovered near the long, snaky stream of water rising from the cup. So far, he hadn't touched Corners, either, except accidentally, when Corners moved in a way that splashed him. "I made you a friend the same way I made my other friends: we met accidentally and decided we want to spend time together. It wasn't a planned thing." And now Thera was glaring at him for a translation in turn, which meant he had to provide it.

"You would have preferred if we had simply shown up one day at the fortress and obliged you to take care of us?" Thera lifted a hoof and held it in the air, turning her leg back and forth. "Perhaps that would have appealed to your sense of the dramatic, but it doesn't sound much like a workable plan to _me_."

Harry groaned a bit. "This doesn't work," he said. "It's something else that defines my friendships, with Ron and Hermione and the other Weasleys and Corners here." He tapped the cup firmly this time, persuaded that Corners wouldn't flow anywhere unless he wanted to. "I can't put it in words. But I can tell you I don't want anything from anyone else in the alliance. There's no reason for them to appeal to me, when I can't exchange gifts with them."

Thera lowered the hoof to the grass and stared at him again. "I find it arrogant," she said, "to decide that you want nothing of anyone before you have met them all."

Harry cursed the flush rising along his cheeks. He was still too vulnerable to scolds, perhaps because it had been one of the prime methods the Dursleys had of punishing him.

_And that's another sign of how different it is here. How _stupid. _How often did I think of the Dursleys before I came here?_

"There's nothing I want," he said. "There's nothing I really have to offer, except things that other people can offer equally well. And since I'll leave and live among people who aren't part of the pure-blood alliance, it can't affect me."

"Even if the alliances turn out to be the best way of building your wizarding world up again?" Thera cocked her head. "I understood that the Ministry barely survives, thanks to the war, but what is left is run by bitter old men."

Harry closed his eyes and shook his head. He _hated _the way people could turn his words around on him, and come up with circumstances that sounded plausible, and imagine ways he could keep sacrificing himself.

It wasn't enough that he hated politics and wanted to be done with them. No, everyone insisted he be more involved.

_Except Ron. He was the one who told me I played them too often, and that I should come back home and stop doing that. I wish I'd listened to him and committed myself to the thought of getting out of here instead of winding myself in._

"They should not taunt you so," Corners said suddenly. "At the moment, you are the only human one of the Water People wishes to speak with. They have no hope of bringing us to the alliance if they cannot keep you."

Thera turned her head and looked at Corners with steady interest, but didn't respond to his words, which surprised Harry. Then he smiled a little. The centaurs spoke English, and even if they used some other language among themselves, it was clear that that didn't involve Parseltongue. And Thera was too cautious to respond to a tone in the voice she might not be sure she understood.

"He says that the Water People won't want to become part of the alliances unless you can retain me somehow," he told Thera. "And at the moment, I don't think you have a hope of doing it."

Thera nodded. "Perhaps not. Yet I find it hard to think that, among all the gifts the centaurs and the werewolves and your own kind can offer you, there is _nothing _you want."

Harry shrugged. "Perhaps not. But I can't think of it." Draco had asked him that, too, what he wanted besides to go back to his friends. But Harry thought going back to his friends was a laudable goal in and of itself. At least he would have the freedom and the quiet he desired and couldn't get here.

Thera nodded again. "Then perhaps it is for the best that you go."

Harry closed his eyes. He hadn't realized the chains hanging on him, or the way they would fall off, until she said those words. "Thank you," he whispered. "You can make my excuses to Kleianthe, and the children?"

"I can," Thera said. "Though I would prefer you did it yourself, since you are here and so are they."

Kleianthe turned around, her smile fixed on her face in a way that Harry had not seen since the first day she came. "Thank you for your hospitality, Mr. Potter," she said. "I shall not forget that you were the first one to welcome us." She reached up to the bracelet that had formed for her arm when she first came, as the result of his oath, and snapped the links. Harry gasped. The sound and the ease with which she did it went straight through him.

He turned, and saw the chain he had received in return crumbling apart into dust and ash.

"You can break your oaths," Kleianthe said quietly. "Since this alliance does nothing for you, and there is nothing here for you, you should. You will not keep the promises you made to us when we first came."

Harry shook his head. Corners was swaying back and forth, but Harry didn't think he would actually attack, so he said nothing to hold him back. "I—I didn't mean I _wanted _to do it," he said, "or that I enjoyed it. But I can't keep the promises because I took this up out of boredom, and Malfoy will do better, and I don't want to keep giving of my life to people who don't appreciate it."

Kleianthe nodded. "I wish it had worked out differently," she said, with a simplicity that made Harry wince the same way the breaking of her chain had. "You seem like a natural and trustworthy ally, more so than most of the other humans I have met. But I can think of nothing to offer you, either."

There seemed nothing more to say after that. Draco had asked him to prepare the centaurs for his leaving, and it seemed Harry had done that. He bowed awkwardly to them, and then turned to the centaur fillies in the corner of the garden.

Cadmaea and Starborn exchanged timid looks, and then Cadmaea moved towards him with a tap of one hoof. "You're going," she said.

"I won't be here anymore, no matter where I am," Harry said. He tried to remind himself that it would probably take days, if not weeks or months, before Hermione's plan would succeed well enough for Snape to agree to renegotiating the Unbreakable Vows. "I hope you don't—that is, I hope you don't mind my leaving."

"We were just getting to know you," Starborn said.

There seemed nothing he could say to that, so Harry mumbled a few commonplaces and then turned back towards the fortress with a sense of relief. He would almost rather stay here than go through that again, but he could hear Ron scoffing in the back of his head at the notion, and he knew he was being stupid. He simply didn't have the time or the wherewithal to remain here, and there was no other parting that would be so painful. Corners could come with him. The Ashborn wouldn't care where he was going. The parting with Draco had been last night, and even if they saw each other again before Harry left, he couldn't imagine it would be with the same depth or cordiality.

And then there was Snape, who appeared around a corner before Harry could get back to his rooms and regarded him silently. Corners still swayed above his cup. He examined Snape with some interest; Harry had told him about Snape, as much as he knew.

"What?" Harry snapped, and fought the urge to fold his arms. It was hard to do that with a cup in one hand, and not have it look awkward. He almost wished for a moment that Corners had not called him, or at least that Harry had not _heard _the call.

"Will you come back to my lab?" Snape turned his hand so Harry could see the parchment dangling from his hand. "Miss Granger sent me a most interesting letter."

Mouth filled with water that tasted like hope, Harry nodded, since he couldn't say anything and be sure his voice would work for him, and followed Snape.

* * *

Draco had not exaggerated. He had found Severus this morning and told him about Potter and the water snake. Severus had controlled his fury and nodded his thanks. Of course Potter should have asked his permission to bring the snake into the fortress before he did so, but Potter didn't obey the ordinary rules, and Severus should have given up on any expectation that he would.

"Thank you, Draco," he'd said, when Draco hesitated. "You may go back to bed now. Be assured I shall try to treat Potter and the snake with the respect at least one of them deserves."

Draco shook his head and brought his hand as though he was going to comb it through his blond hair. "It's more than that," he said. "The snake's changed Potter somehow. He's—more confident than I saw him be before. It's like having someone to fight for changes him, someone who depends on his protection."

"If the snake is one of the Water People, I doubt it truly needs his protection," Severus said dryly. The books he possessed which mentioned the Water People were not very numerous, but the mentions made him sure they were comfortably powerful. And also hard to kill, given that they could dissolve their bodies into water at a moment's notice.

"Not what I mean," Draco mumbled. "Potter—he's right. He needs friends around."

"But he thinks neither you nor I can become one," Severus finished. He did not find the information surprising, not when he thought of the expression Potter wore when talking about to or to his friends and the expressions he usually wore when confronting Severus, even about something so intimate as his past.

"That's not surprising, is it?" Draco had tilted his head back so he was looking at the ceiling and sighed. "We're very different from his friends. Slytherins, instead of Gryffindors. Clever, instead of stupid."

"Miss Granger is not stupid," Severus said. He let his voice carry the edge of a warning tone, not because Potter was there to hear and be upset, but because he did not wish to encourage Draco in lazy perceptions. For too long lately, he had not cared that Draco said stupid things and believed ones that were worse. But he would keep him away from careless habits now.

"Yes, but she's _intelligent_," Draco said. "Not clever."

Severus had leaned nearer to him and poured him a fresh glass of wine. It was nearly four in the morning when Draco came, woke him up, and told him about Potter and the water snake, but Severus had released any anger once he heard the reason. Yes, it was important to know this. "I was unaware that you made that much of a distinction between those two adjectives."

Draco seized the glass and gulped some more wine. Severus hid his wince with an effort. That was an expensive year. "I mean she can solve problems and mysteries and write essays and do Arithmancy equations. But she's shit at using that intelligence to her own advantage with other people."

Severus did not give the chuckle he wanted to, but it was with an effort. It sounded dangerously like Draco was saying Slytherins were interested in people, while Gryffindors—or at least smart ones like Granger—were interested in useless things like facts and potions and ingredients.

Perhaps Draco caught the edge of a chuckle anyway—not impossible, not when they were closer than they had been in some time and he was more perceptive than Severus had given him credit for. He sat up straighter and glared at Severus. "Potter doesn't like people who are clever. He calls them manipulative. He thinks we should all react the way he does, charging blindly at everything and being the prey of our emotions."

Severus turned his own glass in his fingers, avoiding Draco's eyes for the moment. He was wondering—and ashamed to find himself wondering—whether Potter would have liked him better when he _was _the prey of his emotions, back when Potter had first arrived, and prone to tantrums simply because the man did not fit the boy he remembered.

_Man. He is not a boy, no matter how childishly he sometimes acts when we speak of the past. He has changed too much, and I reminded myself of that thought once, the evening I first tried to use Legilimency on him, and then forgot it again._

Severus sighed and set the glass down. There were still the Vows to bind Potter here, but he did not know how much longer they would hold. "Go back to bed, Draco. The Water People do change things, but I will talk to Potter about them in the morning. You look as though you could use the rest."

Draco did sway when he rose to his feet, and Severus thought it was probably with weariness, not the wine. But he stood there anyway, holding onto the back of his chair, and met Severus's eyes with a gaze so stark that Severus looked away before he could think about the impression he would present.

And why was he so worried about impressions in front of Draco, anyway? Draco had seen him broken and bleeding after torture sessions in front of the Dark Lord; he was the one who had taught Seveurs some of the simpler charms for fixing wounds and stopping the flow of blood that Severus had never bothered to learn. Silly to believe that he would not know more about pain and wounds than Severus did.

"We both want him," Draco told him quietly. "I want him as a friend. And I don't really care if the only reason I do is because he refused me when I was a child. I still want him."

"Perhaps you may have him," Severus said as soothingly as he could. "I do not think Potter the kind to deliberately choose to hurt someone, if he can also gratify his own wishes. He may write to you after he leaves."

"And you want him, too," Draco said, with that brutal clarity Severus remembered best from his own father. None of the Death Eaters was in the habit of getting drunk, and he had found when he tamed the minds of the mad ones, such as Bellatrix, that their freedom from conventional rules of behavior did not necessarily give them insight into the people around them. "Not as a friend. I don't think you care about that."

"No, I certainly do not," Severus said, relieved that Draco understood something in proportion, given the way he was speaking. "I would be satisfied if—he—would understand that I am trying to calm him down and help him face his past so he would refrain from destroying the Ashborn or blowing the fortress up around us."

"But he's already calmer," Draco said. "And you told me about the Sorting Hat wanting to put him in Slytherin."

Severus frowned. "So?" He had thought sharing the news with Draco would help him overcome some of his own incredulity at it. Draco was the only one around him who would react with the right amount of incredulity, come to that. The Ashborn would nod and widen their eyes only if he told them to.

"You think he should have been yours," Draco said. "Because you think all the Slytherins should have been yours. I've seen the way you looked at the Death Eaters who were Slytherins, trying to figure out what made the Hat put them there, or how you would have treated them if they were students there when you were Head. It frustrates you that Potter didn't go where he was told, and you didn't get the chance to work around him and come to some kind of compromise with him while he was still eleven."

Severus sat still, and kept his fingers carefully wrapped around the edge of his glass. He did not know how Draco had come to that conclusion, and he would be some minutes finding the words to refute it.

And wondering how Draco had seen so clearly.

"It's obvious to someone who watches you and cares what you think," Draco said, as if he had heard the words and decided to answer the thoughts behind them. "Of course, not many people have ever done that, have they?" His hand opened for a moment, and then closed again. He looked sad, angry. Disgusted. Severus did not know if the last emotion applied to him, or—perhaps, new thought—was for the people who had never cared enough to pay attention to what Severus wanted.

"You think of yourself as Head of Slytherin, a Slytherin, first and foremost," Draco continued.

Severus found his voice then. "I think of myself as a Potions master first and foremost," he said. "You would be interested to know that I do not often change my mind on such matters as my self-definition."

Draco shook his head impatiently. "No. Maybe if you'd got away from Hogwarts and had a life beyond that, beyond teaching, before the last few years, then you would have done that. Or you would have thought of yourself as a Death Eater first if you'd remained loyal to the Dark Lords. But because circumstances forced you back to Hogwarts, you were thrown together with people of your House. That's your identity. So now you're staring at Potter, hoping for clues in his expressions, hoping someone can tell you how in the _world _you missed seeing the seeds of a Slytherin in him. He's not a good actor. How could he have kept them hidden so long?"

Severus returned an answer that had something to do with even Gryffindors possessing more power of lying than they assumed they did, and sent Draco away satisfied.

But he was not satisfied himself, and so he started towards the next meeting with Potter with trepidation growing in the back of his mind.

"What do you want in return for letting me go, Snape?"

And that led him back to this moment, the moment where he was sitting in his lab with Potter, and not his bedroom with Draco. The letter in his hand was from Granger, but it was only the excuse to bring Potter here. In it, Granger gave disappointing news: that she had failed to place a second Potions article, and it therefore might be some time before she managed to get anyone else interested. The list of Potions journals where she could submit—where she had a reasonable chance of placing the work, at least, or thought she did—was not extensive.

Severus handed the letter over and let Potter read. The snake of the Water People danced in his cup, meanwhile, and watched Severus. Severus never released his gaze in return, though he had to blink and the serpent did not. He wondered if Potter knew how dangerous the Water People were, how disastrous they could be to anyone who carried water as part of their bodies. They could flow down a throat, or into an ear, and wreak havoc on the human body from inside.

And Potter befriended one as though none of that mattered.

_It does not. Not to him._

The realization stuck in Severus's throat, but he forced himself to work it through, because it was important.

_Potter does not think about how dangerous other people are. It is something, perhaps, that he would find hard to do, after how the Dark Lord pursued him nearly all his life. He does not make friends because of power, or because he is thinking of what they could do for him in the future, or even out of fascination because he has never seen the Water People and wants to know more about what they do._

_He chooses his friends because he likes them and wants to be around them, and perhaps because they are nice to him._

Those were truths that Severus had always known about Gryffindors, of course. But after seeing Potter's memories, and after having Potter agree to become a hostage so that the Ashborn and his followers would not have to fight another war, Severus had thought Potter was different.

_You thought he was different from the beginning, when you compared him to his father. James would have seen the best way to torment someone in a different House, and half the decisions he made were based on that. _

Severus half-shook his head and said, "Unbreakable Vows can be replaced with other Unbreakable Vows, if both parties agree."

Potter frowned at him and said, "But I thought you liked the bargain we had now. That letter says it might be a long time until Hermione can give you something you want as much as you want an undisturbed life."

"I realize, with you here, that an undisturbed life is not what I most want," Severus said. "I would settle for the Ashborn being safe from the attacks of your people. I thought I needed your life as a chain on your friends, more than as a chain on you."

Potter grimaced. "You want Ron and Hermione to make Vows to you? I think Hermione might, but Ron wouldn't. He's already angry because he thinks I'm sacrificing myself too much for you."

Severus shook his head. "I was thinking of us both swearing another Vow, or pair of Vows," he said, and swallowed the thick sickness that welled in his throat when he thought about that. He had been bound by too many of them in this life.

_But choosing to make them is different than Albus, or political circumstances, forcing me to swear them. That must be true._

"What, though?" Potter demanded. "There's nothing we could swear that would make sense and still keep the agreement between us not to attack each other alive."

"Really?" Severus asked. He had been thinking about this ever since Draco told him Potter had one of the Water People with him, and except that he knew more now about the peculiar way Potter's mind worked, he would have expected him to be thinking of it, too. "You could go on long visits to your friends, all but live with them, while keeping enough of a base in the fortress that it would seem as if we were keeping our original agreement of you being a hostage. I would still want some private guarantee that your friends would not attack me in revenge over my original treatment of you, but it need not be a Vow. And you could help Draco, still. I know he would value that."

Potter stared at him with narrowed eyes, and with a light in the back of them that nearly made Severus wince in anticipation. He knew what was coming next, but he wasn't sure that Potter did.

Or at least, he did not know where the conversation would end up. But Severus's reckonings on that score might be wrong, as well.

"No," Potter said. "I don't believe this. Private agreements and hostage agreements and all the rest aside, this is too much for you to give them without demanding something in return." He laughed without joy. "And what else could I give you? You don't want my friendship, the way Draco does."

"No," Severus agreed. Draco had been right about that.

"What, then?" Potter shook his head. "You've helped me, by your lights, and that means a lot to someone like you." _If not to me, _his eyes and the stubborn tilt of his head said, and Severus could accept that to him, something like that meant far less than to Severus. "So what do you want in return for it?"

Severus would have given a minute shrug if he was alone. As it was, he had no reason to, and he put the shrug into his voice instead. "I want your attention. I want the chance to understand you, to understand why I never saw the Slytherin in you before."

"My comment about the Sorting Hat bothered you _that_ much?" The snake rising from the cup next to him hissed, and Potter reached up and let a hand hover next to its neck, but he never looked away from Severus. "It was just like I said. I had some traits that could have put me in Slytherin, but I begged the Hat not to do it. That's all. A little, stupid story for you to be making a big deal of."

_It is Slytherin to underplay something that other people have shown is important, _Severus decided. _At least, if you do not want to be noticed._

And of course the boy—the boy Potter had been—had not wanted to be noticed. Severus could not claim he had hidden that particular trait. Severus's preconceptions had made sure he ignored it and saw only the attention-seeker he knew James would have been in his son's particular situation.

"Draco told me I identify myself with my House," he said. "That much is true. I have found a Housemate in you."

"A _potential _Housemate," Potter corrected him at once. "If I had given in to the Hat's pleading, I might have gone to Hufflepuff or Ravenclaw. It didn't say Slytherin was the ultimate choice, just that I'd do well there."

"And that also changes the boundaries of how I think," Severus corrected him in turn. "Because it seems to me that House traits do not change, that you are born one way and must be that way. It was important of me to think of myself as Slytherin, and important to most of my Housemates, as well. And important to your father to think of himself as Gryffindor. Even Black. He had never expected to be put into that House, but once he was, he clung to the ways it made him different from the rest of his family."

"And my mother?" Potter challenged, leaning forwards like a horse about to bite.

Severus checked the immediate response he wanted to give when a wound was pressed, and in the end, only shook his head.

"Well, then." Potter leaned back in his chair. "I can't really understand it. To me, it matters a lot more whether someone is nice to me or not." The snake hissed again, and this time, Potter glanced up and smiled at him.

_I understand that, now. And in its own way, that is Slytherin. We may choose our allies by how they can benefit us, but that is not how we choose our friends. And most of us do make a distinction, Slytherins like the Dark Lord and Lucius notwithstanding._

"When I am wrong about something," Severus said quietly, "I wish to know why. I wish to understand. Your remaining near enough to me that I can understand you is what I would willingly swear Vows for."

"That's…insane." Potter turned his head, and those green eyes cut through Severus's as Lily's had once done—

No. They cut as _intensely _as Lily's had once done, but for different reasons. Severus took a deep breath and felt as though he had undone chains that cut him where they crossed his chest. He did not know why, but he could breathe more freely than he had done for some time.

Because he wanted to know more, he shook his head. "No. For someone like you, who defines yourself otherwise and has different goals, yes, it would be hard to understand. But I am my own master now. I have people to serve me. I have a lover. I have the potions lab I've dreamed of. If I want to spend my time perfecting my understanding of the world around me, then I can do so."

Potter scowled at him and flipped his fringe out of his eyes, as if he wanted to emphasize the scar that had done so much to separate them since the beginning. "Shame you didn't try to understand Draco better from the beginning. I might never have had to intervene between you."

Severus let his gaze cool. While he wished to conciliate Potter, that was not the same as agreeing with his every word. "Yes, a shame," he murmured. "But it is also you."

"What?" Potter sounded like his godfather when he barked like that. "You think it's somehow my fault that you and Malfoy weren't getting along right at first?"

_He calls Draco by his last name sometimes, sometimes by his first. Interesting. _Severus shook his head. "Not what I meant. There are few in the world I would be willing to swear Unbreakable Vows for because of my interest in commanding their attention. Draco, yes. And you."

Potter paused, his eyes flickering and his head tilting to the side. The snake hissed again, urgently, and this time Potter responded with a long, flickering hiss that made dark purple spots dance in Severus's sight. He could have gone all his life without hearing Parseltongue again, after hearing the Dark Lord speak it so long, and yet…

It was Potter.

"Because I'm my mother's son?" Potter asked it cautiously, as if afraid of the answer.

Severus shook his head once more. "Because you are you," he said. "Son of the man I hated and the woman I loved. The Chosen One. The boy I sacrificed and worked for and who I thought would never acknowledge it. The one who killed the Dark Lord who tormented me, and who tormented Draco. Someone important to Draco. I am not _proud _that you are someone I would do this for. But I am willing to, because I have never understood you, and wish to."

"You're mad," Potter said again, but he sounded less than convinced.

"You may think that," Severus said, and waved him out the lab door. "You will have longer visits from your friends, more freedom, as long as you agree not to abandon us altogether. That is partially for Draco's sake—"

"But more for your own," Potter finished, still staring at him.

Severus nodded, not willing to deny it. He closed his eyes when the lab door shut behind Potter. So much honesty left him feeling hollow.

But at least he had told the truth. And at least he stood a chance of knowing _himself _better, if Potter would not agree.

* * *

"I don't trust him," Corners hissed the moment the door shut behind them.

Harry smiled at him and reached up to stroke the side of his neck. "That makes two of us."

Corners paused and slid his head through his neck, so that his bright eyes faced Harry upside-down. "Truly? I had thought you agreed with him, because you listened to him so long."

Harry shook his head and began to carry the cup down the corridor. He could have floated it beside him using a spell, he knew, but he didn't feel like doing so, and he thought Corners would have been a little offended and hurt if he had. "No. I don't understand what he wants, why he wants my attention."

"Because your attention is worth having."

Harry opened his mouth to argue that, to say Corners only felt that way because Harry was a Parselmouth and new to him, and it wasn't objectively true…

And then shut it again. Because he was thinking about the way Snape had told him he undervalued himself, and it collided, oddly, in his head with Ron saying angrily that Harry was too selfless, that he sacrificed himself too much.

_Maybe, sometimes, I can allow myself to think I'm important to people._


	20. Fighting and Falling

Thank you again for all the reviews!

_Chapter Twenty—Fighting and Falling_

"I don't think it's enough, mate. It's still a leash."

Harry sighed and took a bite of the fruit that the Ashborn had provided him and Ron when they wanted to meet. Hermione had been too busy to come, still futilely trying to place articles with Potions journals. At least the apple in his mouth was sweet and tart at the same time and made up for some of the frustration that Harry got from staring into Ron's strong, stubborn, freckled face.

"Right, but at least it's not the same kind of leash that Snape had on me before." Harry swallowed the bite of apple, because Ron was giving him the kind of stare at his speaking with his mouth full that he'd probably learned from Hermione. "Something has to stay between us, I agree with that much. I don't think the Ashborn would attack unless Snape told them to—I didn't understand the kind of control he had over them before—"

"A perverted control." Ron hadn't touched the food so far, as though he was afraid it would poison him. He folded his arms and glared at Harry.

"I totally agree," Harry said grimly, and tried not to look back at the door into the fortress, where Bellatrix was waiting for him. He knew he would meet empty eyes and a wand that hung down at her side because Snape had assigned her to be his guard but not on her guard all the time. "So far, though, I haven't managed to convince him to release them. But if he'll agree to this, to me spending long periods of time away from the Ashborn, that might be the first step."

"What do you owe him?" Ron drummed a closed fist on the table. "What do you owe _them_? So many of them were your enemies before you won the war, Harry. Why should you care about what happens to them now?"

Harry blinked at him. "But a minute ago you were saying that the way Snape controlled them is perverted," he said, feeling as though he'd fallen off a horse.

"Right. It is." Ron picked up a slice of orange from the bowl in the center of the table and looked at it as if it would grow teeth. Harry smiled in spite of himself. One of the things he missed the most about his friends was that he felt as if he _understood _them. He was never sure what Snape and Malfoy were feeling, and of course the Ashborn had few to no emotions of their own, so it wasn't important what they felt.

He licked his lips a moment later, swallowing the taste of bile rather than apples this time. _And if I really care enough about them to want Snape to relinquish his control, why am I thinking things like that? _

Corners, in his cup on the corner of the table, curled his head around to watch Ron from the rim. Ron had blinked at the introduction to Corners, but taken it in good part. Harry thought Corners liked Ron more than he had liked either Malfoy or Snape, but it was hard to be sure. He hadn't said much, only hissed a polite greeting for Harry to translate and then taken up that watching.

"Then why talk like that?" Harry asked. "It's not a case of owing, any more than I owed some of Voldemort's prisoners I rescued. It's a case of seeing something that has to be done and doing it."

Ron practically slammed the slice of orange back into the bowl. "Right, mate," he said, speaking with exaggerated care. "But you don't _understand_. It's not—about things like that. You've done enough things that other people didn't want to do. You should be allowed to rest, not dragged back into the struggle just when you thought you were going to be free from it."

"Maybe so," Harry muttered, and ate another piece of apple just because he could. "But it doesn't work out that way. Here I am, and I can't help being concerned about the Ashborn. I don't think I could force Snape to let them go, but I could persuade him. Hermione seems to be persuading him to let me go. Amazingly."

"More than she should have to pay," Ron said, and his face was shadowed in a way that Harry wondered if he was only noticing for the first time. Perhaps it had always been there. "More than you should have to pay. The investment of time and attention and money, on Hermione's part, and life, on yours. So Snape and Malfoy can be content? Is that what it's all about?"

"Snape," Harry said. "Until I got here, Snape was the only important one. I don't think he'd paid attention to what Draco wanted for a very long time."

"And that's another thing," Ron muttered, leaning forwards and staring into Harry's eyes with a piercing regard that made Harry shift uneasily from side to side, raising one hand as if he could keep Ron's gaze from his neck. "You didn't used to call Malfoy Draco, either."

"I didn't know him then," Harry said, conscious of the way he was turning his head aside, and promptly turning it back. He didn't want to look as though he was weak in front of Ron—

_Weak in front of your best friends? Are you listening to your own thoughts? _

Oddly enough, the voice he used to address himself in his thoughts was starting to sound more and more like Malfoy. Harry took a deep breath and forced himself to speak. "I think—Ron, I'm not being forced to do this. Snape never asked me to think about the Ashborn. He never asked me to think about Draco. He wanted to forget about everything but what was outside his walls. In fact, the reason he agreed to swear Vows to me is because he thought it would help him do that. Get rid of enough other things demanding his attention and he can just stay in his lab for the rest of his life."

Ron snorted and folded his arms. "You make it sound like some kind of miracle of altruism that he ever ventured out."

"He would think of it that way, I'm sure." Harry rubbed his forehead when Ron glared at him. Everyone seemed displeased with him lately, except Corners, and sometimes Corners watched him with what Harry thought would have displeasure, except one of the Water People was too polite to show it to the first Parselmouth they'd ever met. "Ron…I can care about Snape and Malfoy and the Ashborn, or at least care that certain things change that probably won't if Snape never _wakes up_, and I won't care about you or Hermione any less."

"Who's worried about that?" Ron asked loudly, glaring around as if he expected the table to grow a mouth and answer the accusation. "Not me!"

"Glad to hear it," Harry answered dryly. He leaned forwards and squeezed Ron's hand when Ron looked at him worriedly and made no move to answer him. "Listen. What I want is to be back with you and Hermione. That was never in doubt. But I can still worry about the Ashborn, and Snape, and Malfoy."

"You just said that," Ron pointed out.

Harry nodded. "But I think you need to hear it again. I want to be concerned about everyone and able to work to free them if needed."

Ron stared at him as though he had grown a second head. "But that was what you did during the war," he whispered. "Do you really _want _to go on doing what you did during the war all your life?"

Harry opened his mouth to give some light answer, something about how he had wanted to be an Auror before, and Aurors spent all their lives chasing and fighting Dark wizards, and after Voldemort, how could anyone assume he would want that? But no one had questioned him when he stated _that_ desire.

And then…

And then, worlds moved in his mind, and thoughts collided, and he almost laughed when he realized that there might be an answer to Draco's and Ron's frustrated questions about what he wanted, or how he _could _want certain things, and a reason why it was hard to answer them, as well.

"What I want," he said slowly, and felt the words moving in his mouth, as sweet in their own way as those pieces of apple he had eaten, "is to help people, yes. I was busy during the war, and frightened, and angry, and I could give those things up and never have to feel them again to think I was doing a good job. But I was also happy when we freed prisoners. Or when I spent those three days with George because there was no one else I could spend them with and we talked about how it wasn't his fault that some of the Death Eaters stole his jokes and used them against us. Or when I dragged Hermione back to that mudfield where you almost died and we cast spells together to find you."

Ron shuddered. "Don't remind me. Spending a day almost buried to your eyelids in mud is _not _fun."

"And you think crawling through half-digested dragon food is?" Harry softened when he saw the way Ron stared at him. "Sorry. Anyway. What I'm saying is that that's what I'd like to do. Help people. Comfort people. Soothe them back to health. Find what they need when they need it, and give them their freedom when it's that. Those were the times I was happy. I want to be happy, and that's what I need."

"You're making up excuses to sacrifice yourself again," Ron whispered, and reached tentatively out to him as though he thought Harry would snap at him if Ron touched him too quickly. "What you should want is—"

"What I _want _is for other people to stop telling me what I should want," Harry snarled at him, and tore his hand free.

Ron rocked back in his chair again, wincing. Harry stared back, blinking, and then shrugged a little. Well. Ron had been right about the way that Harry was going to snap at him, then.

"But think about what you could be losing," Ron said. "If you spend all your time devoting yourself to other people's happiness, then you'll lose your chance to live your own life, with your own privacy and your ability to choose what you want to do. Is that worth it?"

Harry stared at him, then snorted. "What would I lose, Ron? Why do you assume I'd spend _all _my time devoting myself to that? I'll have to stop and rest sometimes, and I know that you and Hermione won't _let _me use myself up, and in the meantime, I can be working on things I want to do. That's the point of it being things I want to do, rather than just any old random set of things. I'll have pleasure in doing them for their own sake."

Ron hesitated. Then he said, "I'm just afraid it's the mentality that drove you during the war. You thought you had to be useful. You weren't happy if you weren't being useful. You started fighting Voldemort in the first place because Dumbledore convinced you you had to."

Harry laughed, but also shook his head. He hadn't realized how little Ron understood about the way Harry had approached the war. Not much, if he could still say things like that.

"Dumbledore set me up to find the Horcruxes," he said. "Not fight the war. He couldn't have known how much fighting I'd have to go through, or he'd have tried to prepare me better. He was _over_protective, Ron, if anything. He didn't tell me about the prophecy and train me as he should have because he wanted me to have a normal childhood. I fought Voldemort because he killed my parents, and because he would have killed me and you and Hermione and your family, and because he wouldn't leave me _alone_. And then, later, his people killed Sirius and Dumbledore. Or that was what I thought at the time," he added in some confusion, reminding himself that Bellatrix was standing behind him, and he hadn't really brought up that she'd killed Sirius yet. "I didn't fight because I was some grand hero, Ron. Not only that. I promise."

Ron ran his hands through his hair and blew his breath out through slick lips. "I want to say something, mate," he said. "But I'm afraid you'll get angry. I don't want you to," he added hastily, as if he thought that Harry might think he lived to piss him off. "But I think you will."

Harry leaned back and picked up another slice of apple, mainly so he would have something to do with his hands. "All right. Say it, then."

"You won't get angry?" Ron's eyes skittered across his face and then off to the side like nervous horses.

"I can't promise that," Harry pointed out, keeping his voice as mild as he could. "Because I have no idea what you want to say."

Ron took a deep breath and stared at his clasped hands. "What if you don't want to help people, mate, you only think you do because that's what other people have decided you should want? Do you have any chance—have you ever had a chance—to think about what you want and separate it from other people's theories?"

Harry did feel a slight, hot shimmer in the back of his nostrils and throat, but he managed to laugh. "That took you a lot of courage to say, didn't it?" he asked, and then bit into the slice of apple.

Ron narrowed his eyes as though squinting into sunlight. "And you aren't angry?"

"I am, a bit," Harry admitted, and then rolled one shoulder. "But that's not the point, is it? The point is that you admitted it to me, and it's something I should think about it, if only so you and Hermione aren't thinking it silently and afraid to say anything."

"But have you considered it?" The words leaped from Ron's lips like falling water now. He leaned forwards, and took Harry's hand in his. "Have you considered that what you want most could be influenced by other people's expectations? Sometimes I think you don't think about that enough."

Harry rolled his eyes and reached for another piece of fruit, not incidentally taking his hand out of Ron's. "Make up your mind," he said sharply. "Either I'm very influenced by people all around me, or I don't think enough about what they want. Both of them can't be true at once."

Ron leaned back and watched him with a careful set to his mouth. "You _are _angry about this," he said accusingly after a moment.

Harry looked off to the side, and took a deep breath, and let the scents fill his lungs, felt the light and the stone of the fortress collide in his mind and create a balance of opposites. He spent a few minutes thinking about that, and only about that, before he trusted himself to answer Ron.

"Listen, Ron," he said quietly. "Yeah, it sucks. I wish I could have had a different life. I wish I wasn't the one who had to kill Voldemort. I wish my parents were still alive. I wish someone else had signed their life away as hostage to Snape and Malfoy, and that they would have _accepted _someone else.

"But I'm the person I am. And I can either spend the rest of my life second-guessing myself and being sure that what I want is really just the product of what other people demanded of me, or I can try my best and actually achieve what I want. Sooner or later, I have to stop exploring into motives and deciding that I can never trust what anyone else says or where my desires come from. Sooner or later, I have to accept it."

He saw Ron's head shake from the corner of his eye, and shut his eyes in response. His best friends were his lifeline in a situation like that, although Corners could be that, too, if Harry let him. He didn't want to argue with them, but he thought Ron was rather forcing him into an argument.

"But what if," Ron whispered, "what if you can't trust anything you think? What if your thoughts have roots deeper than the ones you know about? What if you _have _to be sure of your motives, because what you do is so important, but you can't be sure because you don't know all the roots of your motives?"

Harry looked into his eyes and said, "I don't think this has much to do with me at all, does it?"

Ron started and half-turned away from him. Now _he _was the one staring at the garden wall and the twining vines that covered it, and clenching his hands as though he expected someone to try and take his fingers from him. Harry waited, sipping now and then at the juice that covered the small slice of orange he had taken from the bowl of fruit.

"I want to marry Hermione," Ron said abruptly. "I know that. I've known that since two years ago, since that awful day when I thought she was dead and we barely got her back."

Harry nodded. He remembered that day. Hermione had fallen into a Death Eater trap that forcibly Apparated the victim into their hands, behind him and Ron one moment as they crept through the undergrowth towards the house they thought guarded the diadem Horcrux and not behind them the next. Ron had frozen, and Harry had been the one who took over, who guided them in the search, who found Hermione and devised the plan that rescued her. But how could he resent that, when he saw the look in Ron's eyes as he held Hermione in his arms?

"But it's still," Ron said, and swallowed. "I keep putting it off when she asks me. We're engaged, but I can't bring myself to get married yet." He stared at Harry. "Why not?"

Harry snorted. "Do you really think that you'll never get married if you don't do it right after the war? Do you think Hermione is that impatient?"

"I don't know," Ron said. "Because I don't know why I don't want to marry her, see? Why I want to wait." His voice was beginning to rise, steadily, and Harry felt more than heard Bellatrix stir behind him. He made a sharp gesture with one hand that he hoped Bellatrix would understand, and obey. He didn't dare turn away from Ron, not when Ron needed him. Ron rose to his feet and began to pace around the table, his head bowed. "What if I never find out? What if it turns out that I'm really too childish for her, or I just don't love her enough? I _have _to know, because if it's something like that, then I owe it to her to tell her right away."

"I think," Harry said gently, "that Hermione understands you better than anyone could. If you tell her you want to wait, even if you don't know why yet, I think she'll agree. And if she asks all the time, or if she's unhappy about waiting, then at least this way she gets to make a decision. It's better than lying to her and making her think you're the eager one."

Ron shook his head. "But she'll want to know _why_. And I don't know why."

Harry rolled his eyes. "You went through a bloody war, Ron. So did she. You're just starting to reestablish your lives. What _reason _do you need that's not covered by that? Or do you think she wants to get married to help heal her scars from those days, or something?"

"That's not it." Ron clenched his teeth and looked as though he would like to reach out and scoop a piece of fruit off the table, but left it alone in the end. "That's not it. You don't get it. I have to think about it. I have to figure it out, because she'll ask questions, and I can't answer them."

"I trust that you love each other," Harry said firmly. "And that will be true whether you get married or not. Talk to her. Explain what's happening, and why you think it might be a problem. See if you can't figure it out together."

"But on the other hand, what if it's nothing?" Ron ran his hands through his hair. "Some kind of lingering trauma from the war or something? I could wake up in a few weeks and be fine. Then I would feel stupid for telling her."

Harry shook his head. "I have faith in the both of you. It's better if you tell her and then get embarrassed than to lie to her—"

"I wouldn't _lie _to her." Ron glared at him.

"Lying by omission, yes, you would," Harry said, and leaned forwards. "You already have, haven't you? Because you're raising these concerns with me, but only after I basically forced them out of you, and you haven't raised them with her."

Ron's redness now extended from his hair all the way down his neck. "That's not the same as lying," he muttered, but his voice trailed off.

"Only if you're going to agree that I'm not lying to myself to want to help people," Harry said. He leaned back and ate the orange slice in his hand. "Otherwise you're saying that you're somehow the exception, the special person who can't lie and who doesn't have to worry about things like that, but I'm the rule."

Ron leaned forwards and frowned at him. "That's right. We were talking about you, and the way that you somehow keep helping people who need your help—"

Harry opened his hand in the air between them, in eloquent silence.

Ron blinked, and then the red started to fade from his face as he laughed. Harry grinned at him, sure everything was going to be all right between them, the way it always was when they argued.

_I can make up with him. I can try to make up with anyone I want. It might not work with Snape and Malfoy, but deciding ahead of time that it won't and it's not worth attempting is something _they _would do._

_ Yes, I'm different from them. I'm me. I'll do things the way Harry Potter would do them, not the way the friends of Harry Potter think he should do it or the way the enemies of Harry Potter would like him to do it._

"I fell into that one," Ron said, shaking his head. "But you don't mind, mate? People ask you for help, and you don't mind giving it?"

Harry snorted and took yet another slice of apple. He would have to ask Snape for more of these to be served at dinner. They tasted delicious. "It depends on the way they ask. Snape or Malfoy demanding my help wouldn't please me at all. But Malfoy is getting over that, I think, given the last things he said to me, and Snape can't—well, to help the Ashborn, if that's what I want to do, I have to stop thinking that Snape should be more sympathetic to me and do all these things for me. He already thinks he is, and that decision rules his action. I can either sulk and refuse, or I can choose to think that he's giving as much as he can. The apology he gave me is a _huge _thing, for him. Little by my standards, but they aren't the only ones that matter."

Ron wasn't laughing anymore. "I hate to see you spending more time on them than you have so far."

"If I want to?" Harry asked softly, cleaning away the juice that had run down his chin.

"How much will you pay?" Ron looked at him with hard eyes that could have been sapphires. "Will you let him trap you and keep you here and deny you food and healing because he's giving you _all he can_?"

Harry grinned at him, curling his lip back so Ron, and anyone watching, could see his teeth. He reckoned Bellatrix might carry a memory of this conversation back to Snape, but that was partially what he wanted, after all, for someone to do that so Snape would learn he was serious. "I won't give in to him. But I can negotiate with him for the freedom of the Ashborn, and for access to Malfoy's friendship, if I decide it's worth having." He sat back in his chair and closed his eyes. The burdens that they had imposed on him were not burdens if he decided they weren't. "Maybe even Snape's friendship, although he says that we won't be friends. I can choose to investigate what that means."

"Mate," Ron said, as though tapping a loose tooth with his tongue, "things don't change their nature because of the way you think about them."

"Depends," Harry said, opening one eye to look at him. "A falling rock? No. You can't reason with that, and if you stand there and try to disbelieve in it instead of moving out of the way, then it'll crush your head just the same. But there were plenty of Death Eaters who decided that Voldemort was worth following and serving, not because they thought he wasn't killing people, but because they thought killing those people was _right. _I don't want to be a slave, and I don't want to be a helpless hostage. I want to seize some control of my life. The way I think of Snape and Malfoy and the claims they pretend they have on me is a start in the right direction."

"What if he won't let you come away with us and live with us?" Ron asked desperately. "Because you know he might decide against it, if he finds out you're looking forwards to it and you still want him to stop controlling the Ashborn."

Harry shook his head. "He was the one who proposed the relaxation of the Unbreakable Vows that were keeping me here in the first place."

"But he might change his mind when he realizes what you're thinking," Ron said, even more desperately. "That you're thinking of changing the chains he put on you into bridges you can walk."

Harry smiled at his friend despite himself. "There's a poetic metaphor, Ron. Were you the one who came up with it?"

"Yeah, me. Not Hermione this time." Ron still didn't smile. He leaned forwards so far that Harry really thought he might fall out of his chair instead of staying in it. "Mate. Listen to me. You can't do this."

"Why not?" Harry asked curiously. "If it's what I want, and I'm pretty damn sure that it _is_, then—"

"It's not what you want in the way you think it is," Ron said, speaking quickly, and Harry was glad he did, because he might have cast a spell at anyone else who said something like that and didn't explain it. "I mean, you think you can change Snape and Malfoy's minds, and I don't think you can."

Harry smiled at him. "Then I can't help them, and I'll retreat. Remember, what I want is to help people. Give advice to them. Save their lives. Maybe I'm warped and maybe that's what the war made me into, but it's still what I want. Snape and Malfoy deciding that I couldn't help them would mean that what I want is _impossible_, and there's no use in continuing to ask them. I'll find something else to do."

"That's," Ron said, and then he blinked and touched his temples with shaking fingers, as though he was trying to soothe away a headache. "That makes sense. At least, I think I understand."

"And I live to make you understand," Harry said dryly, but undercut the hurt he knew Ron might have felt by leaning across the table and shaking his shoulder. "Thanks, mate. I doubt what I want would have come as clear without you. Or at least not as soon," he felt compelled to add, because he had to admit that sooner or later, he thought he would have got it. How many times had he felt happy or peaceful in the last few years, and what was the common link between all those times? It couldn't have hidden itself from him forever.

"If you decide that you can't help them," Ron said, his eyes huge and yearning, "will you come home?"

"I'll come home no matter what," Harry promised. "The only thing that's going to change is the length of time I'll stay there, and how much tolerance I'll have for the times that Snape and Malfoy might call me back to the fortress during it."

He turned away and looked straight at Bellatrix. "And right now, there's something else I want," he said, raising his voice slightly, although he was sure Snape had heard all the necessary words through her ears if he was looking through her at all. "Something that you don't want to give me, but too bad. I want a look inside your mind, Snape. You already had one with me. And this is the only way I can sort out the whole twisted mess of intentions, to understand what's happening with you and what you _really _want from me, not just what you think you do."

* * *

Severus sat quite still as Bellatrix heard those ringing words and they passed down the link that ran from her mind to his, through the Mark and the other bonds he had wound into her thoughts to control her insanity.

It could not be true. Potter had refused all the gifts that Severus had tried to offer him so far: new clothes, peace through talking about his problems, freedom from the Unbreakable Vows. Well, perhaps not that last, Severus had to admit, if what Bellatrix had heard him saying to Weasley was true.

But then, this would not be a gift, would it? Severus asked himself, leaning back against the chair in the lab and closing his eyes to shut out the sights he was receiving from Bellatrix's, the sunlight and the garden and the glow in the green eyes of the man who had turned to face him. This was a taking. Potter was demanding something Severus had not offered, and in fact would never have thought to offer, because he had not imagined that Potter would want to look inside his mind.

_I did not imagine he would dare. _

Of course, that brought up the immediate question of _how_. Potter was pants at Legilimency, and Severus was not sure he would trust the battering efforts of someone like him even so. He could put the memory in a Pensieve—

_No. Not a Pensieve. _The thoughts froze him until Severus shook himself loose and continued on.

_And it is not one memory he wants. It is a look inside the whole mind, the atmosphere and context, and the way that the memories fit together. He wants to be sure he can trust me._

_I cannot trust him. Not to do anything but cause me pain and leave the memories he would seek in small and bleeding pieces._

Severus understood this, however: if he did not acquiesce to what Potter was asking for, he would lose him. And with him, all means of understanding him and the combination of Slytherin and Gryffindor and infuriating and sensible he was. And perhaps all chance of understanding himself as well, and why he was so determined to keep Potter close and peer into his head in the first place.

Severus gritted his teeth.

"Well, Snape? I'm waiting."

Severus opened his eyes slowly, and readjusted his mouth and Bellatrix's so that he could speak with her tongue. "I accept, Potter. But I insist on lending you the power that you need to accomplish the Legilimency, so you do not leave my mind a tattered mess."

Potter smiled, and his smile was merciless and full of joy. _Fear the moment that the boy learns what he wants, _Albus had told Severus once, as a joke, and meaning that Potter would pursue the girl he had chosen with all his heart, once he had figured out which of the girls who swarmed around him was actually the right one.

Now, this smile, all because Potter had decided that what he wanted was to continue being a hero, and it pierced something in Severus that struggled, and squirmed, and bled, and died.

"It applies to Draco, too," Potter said softly. "But not as much, since I trust him more. He was a little weaker than me. You've always made this fuss about being stronger than me, and now you'll have to trust me."

Severus sneered. He was glad that Potter was at a distance from him now, and couldn't see how weak the expression was, though it was possible he heard it in the shade of Bellatrix's voice. "And you'll have to trust me to give you the strength, and not read your mind while you're doing it."

"I can do that," Potter said at once. "Because I'm stronger than you are, despite what you like to pretend. I can get over my past mistakes more easily." He flicked a glance at his friend, who sat still. Severus could not tell at this distance whether that was shock or a wise decision not to interfere with Potter's actions, and then decided that there was probably no difference right now. "I can decide that I'll act and trust myself despite not having one hundred percent pure objective certainty about the reasons for my actions. I'll move."

"I await you, then," Severus said, and broke the connection between his mind and Bellatrix's.

Alone in his lab, he put his hands over his face. His breathing and his body vibrated to one great, low tone of finality.

He had not known he could agree to such a thing. He wondered if Draco would think him weak for it, and then laughed. The laughter began to spiral higher. He cut it off abruptly, shaking his head.

_Draco will not think me weak. It is the kind of thing I think he has been longing for from Potter, almost without knowing it._

_ And, was I…_

He could not explain his fascination with Potter to himself. He had thought Draco's came from Potter's rejection of his friendship when they were children. He had accepted Draco's explanation of how he identified himself with Slytherin and was fascinated with the possible Slytherin qualities in Potter because he had none better.

But he had hinted at something else to Potter, and now, it was here, it was true.

Potter was _himself_. He was something irresistibly fascinating, at least to someone like Severus Snape, with his particular and peculiar history.

So. He would be assisting a man who was no good at Legilimency and who had strong reasons to hate him—a man Severus himself had such severely mixed feelings for—to venture into his mind and perhaps learn the source of those feelings.

To learn a reason to trust him, and perhaps to distrust him completely, if he found the origin of those feelings to be what Severus was beginning to suspect.

But he was committed, now.


	21. Burning

Thank you again for all the reviews!

_Chapter Twenty-One-Burning_

"Where are you going, Potter?"

Draco expected several reactions when he called to Potter: anger, dismissal, gentleness if he was in the mood to talk to Draco after not speaking to him for several days. He didn't expect Potter to spin around, holding out his hand, and pull him close, laughing into his face.

Uneasy, Draco tried to get free. That only caused Potter's grip on his wrists to tighten, and he began to hum under his breath as they danced. Draco looked around for Corners, expecting that Potter would upset the teacup he stayed in, and finally saw the cup hovering near the wall, on a current of Potter's magic. From the way the large blue eyes peered over the rim, Corners _wasn't _pleased with this, but also knew better than to try and interfere.

"What is it?" Draco gasped, barely avoiding being slammed into the opposite wall by Potter's enthusiastic dance.

"I'm going to read Snape's mind!" Potter said, and jigged, and hopped, and then let Draco go and bent over so that he could try and control his laughter. Draco stared at him. Was this what the first stages of going mad looked like? He'd never been able to tell. By the time he saw most mad people, like his aunt, they were already past the first stages and far into the dark lands of it.

"With his help," Potter added, looking up and perhaps catching the wide, uncertain look in Draco's eyes.

Draco shook his head and said the first thing that came to mind. "And he didn't protest?" He couldn't believe it had been Severus's idea, not when he had never allowed even Draco beyond his surface thoughts.

"He would have liked to," Potter said. "But he was watching through Bellatrix when I finally decided what I really want, and he was more willing to have me explore his mind than to just let me go."

Draco's throat felt thick. He swallowed and asked the next question that bubbled up in the wake of his first. "What do you really want?"

Potter moved a step closer to him, and Draco froze. He had never seen Potter like this, with a brilliance that certainly shone in his green eyes but also seemed to glow through other parts of Potter's skin. He stared in mute fascination as Potter reached out and laid one hand along Draco's face, cupping the side of his jaw.

"I want to help people," Potter said. "Just the way I have been, but on my own terms, without having to do it because of Voldemort or because someone is bullying me to." He looked hard at Draco, who swallowed. "And that includes helping the Ashborn. If Snape is smart, and wants me to stay, then I have to know what his intentions are towards me. Hence the reading of his mind."

"That's a privilege Severus has never allowed _me_," Draco said, still without engaging his brain much.

Potter only looked at him, and then moved back. "I wouldn't be jealous of me," he said. "You have a lot more of Snape's heart than I ever will. You were there first, and I can't imagine Snape would let you go. He got jealous of _me _because he thought we were better friends than you and he were."

Draco knotted his fingers into his shirt and wondered how to make clear what he was feeling to Potter without being completely pathetic. "Do you think he would grant me access to his thoughts, too?"

_No, I failed. Still pathetic._

Potter didn't seem to find it so. His expression sharpened as he stared at Draco, and then he said, "Well, the only thing we can do is ask him. Come with me." He started to walk away, not glancing back, as though safe in his utter certainty, without _thought_, that Draco would come with him.

Draco dug his heels into the floor and snorted. "And you think that I'll just follow you wherever you go?"

"When it involves something you really want and that you'll never have the courage to ask for on your own, why not?" Potter replied. He still hadn't glanced back, and that boiled Draco's blood.

He hurried to catch up with Potter, so he could grab his shoulder and spin him around. Corners hissed from his cup, which kept pace with them, floating near the wall. Potter smiled at him and hissed back a few liquid syllables that made Draco have to bite his lips, hard.

"He doesn't like you touching me," Potter said, bringing his eyes back to Draco. "And it's no good trying to stop me, because you _know _it's true. You never would have the courage to ask Snape for what you want, or you would have done it already, before I came and you thought you were happy in your relationship with him."

"Do you know how odd it is to hear you talking about our _relationship_?" Draco asked, making another desperate grab for sanity in the tumbling, sliding mess that was the world collapsing like a landslide around him.

"Why not?" Potter asked, and reached up to close his hand around Draco's. Draco shuddered. The contact ran through him, searing, as though someone had plunged a hot wire into the webbing between his fingers. "You've done everything you could to bring me into your relationship from the beginning."

Draco shook his head to get rid of the daze that seemed to come along with Potter's touch. "That's _not_ true," he said flatly. "You know it's not."

"Yes, it is," Potter said, apparently because he had decided it was his day to argue. Draco, watching the flash in his eyes and the way it made the lightning scar seem to stand out on his forehead, could have wished he had decided this earlier. "You asked for help escaping his control. He wanted to know why I was controlling you, because that's the only way he can imagine someone relating to someone else most of the time. He grew more concerned about you when he thought he might lose you to me. You saved my life and my sanity from the vampire, and then he did his part by going into my mind. And you were the one who basically manipulated us into reconciling after that."

Draco swallowed again, this time to hold back the hot feeling that arose when he thought of that. He had felt strong then, under the impression of weakness, stronger than he had felt since. Well, leaving Potter alone so he could make up his mind about whether he wanted to accept Draco's offer of friendship had apparently worked wonders. It had made Potter decide he did and reach out like this to pull Draco closer to him.

"Come with me," Potter said, and tugged on his hand again. "I think he would want you there, if only to make sure that I don't go too far. And he'll probably feel a bit powerless after I leave, and he'll need you there to assert his power over."

Draco scowled. One moment he was swept along by Potter's bright, chattering insistence, the next he was reminded why he hated this man for so long when they were boys. "That's not the way we work, Potter. Not anymore. Not since-"

He had to close his teeth over the next words, because they would have proved Potter right. Things had changed since he came along. Severus was gentler and more attentive than he had been. Draco had rediscovered some things he wanted and perhaps the courage to try them.

"Great, then," Potter said. "Then he'll need comfort, and you'll be willing to provide it. Come _on_." His next yank on Draco's hand nearly took Draco's feet from under him.

"I'm coming, I'm coming," Draco mumbled, and followed Potter, although he wrung his hand free first. He studied Potter's back, and tried to remember if he had ever seen Potter like this, even following a Quidditch match he'd won, usually the most triumphant times he'd had in school. Draco liked to think of Potter as a braggart, but the plain truth was that he had other emotions painted on his face most of the time. Happiness or pride were rare.

And the sight of them made Draco's feet weak beneath him for a different reason, and his breath quicken for a different reason, and his fingers close down and dig into his palms for a different reason.

_Oh, shit. Oh, _shit. _I really didn't need this._

But apparently he had it, and his mouth ran with water, and he followed Potter to Severus's lab partially because he wanted to and partially because he wanted to see what would happen next.

* * *

Severus had wondered what took Potter so long in arriving, but he knew the moment someone knocked on his door. The knock had the quality of hesitancy to it that only Draco was capable of mustering.

"Come in," he said, and sat up so that he could take a last look around the lab. Yes, the automatons were out of the way and had received their commands to stay quiet, easily breakable vials had shields around them, and invisible Stasis Charms covered the mouths of the cauldrons. If Potter grew angry enough at what he saw in Severus's mind to fling objects about, Severus should lose nothing valuable.

Draco came in first, followed by Potter. Severus stared at Potter first. The burning brilliancy visible in him through Bellatrix's eyes had not dimmed when Severus could see him with his own.

And the judgmental snake still floated beside him in its cup, bright gaze never wavering from Severus's face.

"I brought Draco because he wanted to ask you a question after this," Potter said, and took the chair he'd used when they had their private sessions before this. "Tell me the incantation that will join your talent to my magic." He drew his wand and gave Severus a long-lasting stare.

_I would have sworn he did not know those terms or how the spell worked. _But perhaps Potter had acquired such knowledge during the war and simply never seen a need to employ it before now. Severus grimaced and sat up further, staring at Potter as his own knowledge swung into line. Enabling Potter to use his own Legilimency to read his own mind would be debilitating.

"I ask, first, that you try to put your resentment at me aside," he said. "You will cause me pain because you are inexperienced. Attention to nothing but your own pleasure will increase that pain."

Potter's grin widened. "Are you instructing me in Legilimency or in sex?"

Severus choked. But he saw the way Draco's hands shook as he pushed his hair out of his face, and he felt the flash of heat from deep within his own body, the parts of them that he had fought for so many years to conquer and bring under control, nearly as hard as he had fought with his hatred and fear of the Dark Lord. And he saw the bright challenge on Potter's face not change or falter.

_He knows nothing, and I am not alone in my possible perversions. _That made it easier for Severus to breathe, and to say, "In certain areas, one is not unlike the other. Keep in mind that you will be, in a sense, penetrating me, crossing a barrier I normally permit no one to cross, and which you were also interested in keeping inviolate when your memories defended you."

Potter flushed, then closed his eyes and sat still with an expression of concentration furious enough to satisfy. Severus gestured Draco to take a seat, not wanting the distraction of a hovering presence at the corner of his eye.

Potter stared at him not-quite-glossily when putting his house in order was evidently finished, and his voice was distant thunder. The water snake rose and swayed in its cup, but since that hovered off to the side, Severus was also able to turn his head away so he could focus exclusively on Potter. "This will do?"

"It should," Severus said. He wanted to add _If your effort has been honest, _but he knew that Potter was honest most of the time. He leaned forwards and laid his wand against the side of Potter's head.

The snake swayed faster. Potter's eyelids fluttered, and he said in a breathy voice that made Severus ache in ways he wished he did not, "I can't push all the emotions aside _now. _These are battle reflexes you're waking up."

"That will do," Severus said. "Alertness and not resentment." He waited a few more moments to see if Potter would break or back away from his wand, and when he did not, nodded. "Listen to me now. You will need to repeat the incantation at the same time I do. Lift your wand to my temple."

Potter did so. For a moment, Severus was overwhelmed with visions of what jealousy Draco might be feeling at the moment, and then he put it aside. This was more important than fleeting feelings he must trust Draco to get over. "The incantation is _Legilimens bis. _Can you say it?"

Potter murmured to himself for a moment, then nodded. Severus hissed as he readjusted the position of his wand on Potter's temple, and Potter's eyes opened enough to give him a small flash of green. "Sorry," he murmured.

Just as jealousy and arousal could not overcome him, nor could astonishment at the apology. Severus contented himself with a brief flutter of his own eyelids, so as not to disturb Potter's wand, and then said, "Draco. You will give us a count of three?"

Draco's voice sounded choked as he pronounced the numbers, but at least it was a way to involve him, and Severus would not regret that. On the sound of _three _he and Potter spoke together, their voices mingled. "_Legilimens bis._"

Potter's wand remained still, as it should, but Severus traced the perfectly round circle he needed to against Potter's temple, the one that would send his power flowing into Potter's attempt rather than starting an attempt of his own.

And together, they fell into Severus's mind.

* * *

Harry opened his eyes. He felt stone beneath his feet and against his sides for long moments before he could see anything; a drifting silvery mist before his eyes held his face captive. No matter which way he turned, the mist was there.

An image of being buried alive in a narrow stone coffin, filled with mist that would choke him when it solidified, hit him, and he choked. He took a deep breath and clenched his fists at his sides, determined not to give in to the impulse to lash out. Snape had brought him here. This was his mind, it must be, there was no way for them to have reached a place like this from the lab with the anti-Apparition wards on the fortress. Harry just had to wait for things to come clear.

And there was a wind blowing from behind him.

He remembered what it had said in one book on Legilimency he'd read after the war, in an attempt to understand why his fucked-up memories would prevent someone from accessing his mind. _What matters in Legilimency is the form the imagination gives to the concepts around it. One can be killed not by the force of another's mind but the weapons that one's imagination hands it._

Harry folded his arms and stood still, waiting for the wind-it must be Snape's magic joined to his and permitting him to bypass Snape's Occlumency shields in the first place-to blow away the mist. Sure enough, it did. It whistled past his ears, and then the mist pulled back, and he saw where he stood.

It was a much larger space than he had thought it would be, a huge stone hall, looking like a carved cavern. He was close to one pale grey wall, but not the others. Harry took a step towards the middle of the room and tilted his head back, wondering for a moment if he would see the sky above him, like the enchanted ceiling of the Great Hall in Hogwarts.

No. Instead, he saw immense darkness, probably the black roof of the cavern, and small, gleaming stars. He stared harder, trying to understand, and the stars came clear as lamps of silver and crystal, suspended on long chains let down from the tops of pillars. They filled the darkness with cold, dim light.

_Well, if that's not symbolic of Snape's mind to me, I don't know what is, _Harry thought, and lowered his head so he could look at more things in the room. He'd totally missed whether it had anything in it or not.

It did. Doors, along the sides, all of them made of polished black stone that gleamed slickly, like oil, and all of them sporting immense silver locks. Harry stepped towards the first one, reminding himself again that Snape had agreed to this and so would unlock the doors for him, and pushed it open.

It opened with a particular dramatic-sounding creak, but noise from beyond it immediately filled the air and overcame that. Harry stuck his head gingerly through, wondering if it would be a Quidditch match.

It was, but seen from dizzyingly high in the air. Harry clung to the door so he wouldn't spill over the ledge and craned his neck, wondering if he would see himself anywhere, and whether this was a memory of a time Gryffindor had conquered Slytherin and upset Snape in doing it.

The airy space in front of him filled with reeling brooms, and Harry saw a tiny, thin figure with flyaway black hair clinging to the nearest one. Then a black-clad back intruded between them. It was Snape, hovering on his broom, glaring at the broom Harry was on as if he could make it fall through sheer ill-will alone.

Harry understood in a moment. This was the second Quidditch game he had played during his first year, the one Snape had insisted on refereeing so that nothing like the curse Quirrell had put on his broom could happen again.

Snape tilted his head back to watch Harry sweep over him, and his eyes closed for a moment. Harry watched the expression on his face twist, and knew what he was seeing. He had seen it often enough in the mirror when he heard about some other murder Voldemort had committed to try and make him come out of hiding.

_He hated me, but he also hated himself for feeling that. _

The door fell shut, and left Harry blinking as much from the loss of the air and the noise in the memory as the clang of its shutting. Shaking his head, he turned towards the next one, which was smaller and so might contain a memory that Snape thought he didn't need to guard as closely.

Harry stared when it did open, because it led to a place he recognized-the Astronomy Tower-but not the night Snape had killed Dumbledore, which was what his mind immediately jumped to. He stepped up to the very edge and glanced around, wondering if this was a time he never knew about.

Well, no, because there he was, leaning over the parapet, his hands clenched on the side. But Ginny wasn't with him, or Ron, or Hermione. And he was a lot bigger than he had been in the first memory, playing Quidditch on the broom.

Then he turned his face to the side, and Harry saw tears on his own cheeks, and the memory struck him like a blow, mingling with Snape's like smoke from two different fires blending.

This was a night at the end of fifth year when he had broken away from everyone and come up here because he had thought he might be able to handle his grief over Sirius better when he was alone. He had never meant to worry anyone, although when he came back to the common room he saw that he had anyway. But he had wanted to be away from Hermione's silent questioning looks, the way Ron looked as if he wanted to touch Harry's shoulder, the hugs Ginny had taken to dropping on him for no reason. It was nothing against them. It was everything to do with him.

He wondered, since Snape had seen him and he hadn't been alone after all, whether the git had thought he would jump. Of course not. Wanting solitude wasn't the same thing as wanting death.

But Snape must have thought it was, because God forbid that Harry Potter wouldn't be holding court in a circle of his admirers.

Harry felt fire flow down the connection between them, and for a moment the wind blowing from behind him, the power of Snape's Legilimency joined to his own perceptions, stopped. Then it began to blow again, and tugged on the door, banging it painfully against Harry's shoulder and making him gasp, _forcing _him to pay attention whether he wanted to or not.

The perspective through the door flowed backwards, to the point Harry thought it was the end of the memory. And then he could see Snape, lingering on the top step, his hand on his wand and his eyes on Harry.

_Poised to catch me if I jump, because he thinks I'm really that stupid and selfish, _Harry thought. _I knew it._

The wind tugged at him again, and Harry sighed and tried to pay more attention to Snape. He looked exactly like he always did, except without the sneer. Well, why sneer if there was no one watching you? He looked at Harry, and Harry expected any second, like when he figured out Harry wasn't about to jump, he would mouth some curse and continue down the stairs back to his own rooms.

But instead, Snape leaned against the wall and closed his eyes. When he began to speak, Harry had to lean close and even take a step into the memory to understand, because Snape was talking so softly. He had certainly never heard it when he was younger and stood like that on the Tower.

"So you do mourn for him. Someone can. Lily. I should have known. You tried to tell me, when I thought you would still forgive me. You told me that people can forgive those who hurt them, that people can love idiots. But I was so determined that you acknowledge I hadn't done anything wrong that I ignored you, and then it was too late."

Snape slipped down the stairs, leaving Harry to stand there in his own time, the present-time of Snape's mind, and puzzle out what had just happened, not easy given the rambling and circuitous nature of Snape's words.

A moment later, though, he thought he understood it as well as anyone could. His mum had told Snape she could forgive him, and that she could still love him-as a friend, Harry devoutly hoped-even if he was an idiot, but Snape had probably thought she was talking about James. And Snape was still too humiliated by what Harry's dad had done to him. He wanted Harry's mum to say that calling her a Mudblood wasn't wrong.

_Yeah, well. That didn't work out._

Harry could mourn for Sirius, and that had reminded Snape that some people would care for the people he hated, the ones he saw nothing worthwhile in.

Harry thought about that, then shrugged his shoulders. Well, it didn't change anything as far as his perception of Snape went. How could it, when the man had spied on him during a private moment? His perceptions had already included that the git might do that.

Then he scowled. Well, his perceptions had _also _said that Snape would probably interrupt and mock him. Snape didn't do that. He just went back down the Tower stairs, and Harry knew he had never said anything to anyone else, either, or Harry would have heard mockery about it from Malfoy before the end of the year.

That door slammed shut, and Harry turned and went onto the next. The lock tingled and glowed and faded before he could touch it, and the door swung open on a night bright with the flares of spells.

This time, Harry saw what he had expected to see through the last one. This was the night Snape had killed Dumbledore. Snape was running across the grass, away from the Tower, Malfoy a blurred pale shape beside him. Behind came Harry, screaming for all he was worth.

Snape twisted around to block a spell, and Harry caught a glimpse of his face. It wrung him out, and he moved a step back from the door.

He was sure his younger self had never seen that expression of hunger, or anything like it, because he wouldn't have been able to forget it.

Not hunger to kill him, which he would have said Snape was feeling that night if anyone had ever _asked _him what he thought Snape was feeling. But hunger for the power, for the trading of spells, for the duel and the thrum of blood that it evidently produced in his veins, while it did much the same thing for Harry.

Harry shuddered and shook his head, taking another step back. He had learned to appreciate that hunger during the war. It kept him alive and alert during battles when he was doing without food and sleep. It meant he had survived Death Eater ambushes by taking the unconscious signals that his senses had relayed to him-a sound he couldn't remember hearing before, a smell of sweat, the feeling of eyes on his back.

But he had experienced it for enemies. What Snape showed went deeper than that, was more than that.

Because now, of course, Harry could see how carefully he aimed his spells, how he made sure that none of the permanent and debilitating curses came in contact with Harry's skin while still putting up a show that convinced other Death Eaters, such as Greyback, that he was the most bloodthirsty and loyal of them all.

So why look like that, if he was putting on an act? If this duel with Harry was only one more means to the end of serving Dumbledore?

Again Harry stepped back, and again the door shut. He went on to the next one with more hesitant steps, ignoring the wind blowing at his back. Yes, he had Snape's power behind him, helping him. Yes, Snape had agreed to let him read his mind. But Harry had thought that came from having no choice. For some reason, he didn't want Harry to leave, and this was the price Harry had extracted for staying.

But there was no reason for that to influence his past memories. Only the choice of memories.

If this weird hunger for Harry's power ran deeper than the desperation of the moment...if he had other reasons for wanting Harry to stay close...

Harry's hand was shaking as he reached out and laid it on the next door. This one took more pushing to open, and by the time it did, he had steadied his fingers. He was mistaken. He must be. This was his first time reading someone's mind, and Hermione had told him more than once that he was pants at reading expressions, too. He had mistaken what he saw in Snape's eyes in the last memory, that was all. At least in the other memories, he had words and actions to go on.

This door opened into a darker place, a room brindled with smoke and stink. Harry stared at the torch sconce that burned beyond the one barred window. The silver that made it up had been worked into a long-necked dragon, arching back on itself, its jaws buried in its back.

He had only ever seen one place where that design was prevalent: Voldemort's dungeons.

He stepped into the memory and set his back against the barred window, turning towards what he knew he would see.

Snape sat against the far wall, letting his breath in and out, slow and exhaustive sounds that promptly made Harry want to shake him. Malfoy sat across from him, his head bowed in his hands. His pale hair draped around his face, filthier than Harry had ever seen it. Then again, they wouldn't have their wands for Cleaning Charms.

"I don't understand," Malfoy whispered, maybe to his hands, maybe to Snape, maybe to the wall. "When is this going to _end? _When can we finally escape?" He lifted his head and there could be no doubt that he was speaking to Snape, now. "You said you thought it would end soon, but it only continues."

Snape finished his breathing pattern before he responded. Hearing the tautness in his voice, Harry had to admit that that might be because the breathing was keeping Snape from snapping Malfoy's neck. "It will end when Potter defeats the Dark Lord. That is our best hope, and the best thing to hope for."

Malfoy stared at him, which might make this the first time Snape had mentioned Harry. Then he snorted and rolled over, kicking his heels childishly up in the air. "Sure. _Right_. Whatever. If you didn't know how, you could have just said so."

"I have never lied to you, Draco." Snape stretched with a cracking of joints that sounded surprisingly loud in the stale air of the cell. "I have told you that we cannot escape of our own doing, and have insinuated that it will be Potter's. You cannot accuse me now of pretending to more than I could achieve."

"But you hate Potter," Malfoy said, still with his back turned. "You can't _really _be depending on him. You would hate that more than dying here."

"I hate the thought of nothing more than dying," Snape said, and there was a slight, warning snarl in the back of his voice.

Malfoy heard it and sat back, though he was still shaking his head as though nothing could be greater than his astonishment. Harry shifted to the side so he could better see Snape's face.

Snape sat with his arms folded and his face gone as expressive as the stone of the walls. For a long time, Harry thought he wouldn't speak again, and wondered what the point of showing him this memory had been. So Snape didn't think he could defeat Voldemort on his own, and thought they needed Harry's help. That wasn't exactly _news._

Then Snape sighed and said, "You must understand, Draco. I have more reasons than the prophecy I have informed you of to have faith in Potter. More reasons even than the secrets Albus entrusted me with, though they also play their part."

Malfoy stared at him and swiped a streak of dust off his face with the back of one hand, or tried. It just ended up smearing the dust down the side of his cheek. If he wasn't only an image in the memory, Harry would have told him so. "What are they, then? You never mentioned this."

Again Snape was silent, but this time Harry watched the flexing of his jaw and thought he was getting himself ready to speak. He waited, and with more patience than Malfoy, who was practically leaning forwards and wriggling in place as much as he could without launching himself towards Snape.

"Potter is stronger than you think," Snape said. "Than the Dark Lord thinks. Than _he _thinks. Perhaps only Albus understood him. To face strong enemies as a young child, to kill a basilisk at twelve, to survive experiences that should have destroyed his mind and body and soul, argues for endurance. I do not know what gave him that."

_The Dursleys, _Harry thought. _Or just knowing that I would disappoint everyone if I couldn't do what they needed me to do. That's the worst part of being a hero, knowing that you might be disappointing people._

"But he has it," Snape continued. "And he has-other things. I would not call it charisma, not exactly, but he has the ability to bind people to him so that they follow him. He has stubbornness. He has courage. He has the fidelity to never betray an important trust. Not turning in an essay on time-that is the sort of promise-breaking that becomes him." Snape snarled slightly, and Harry wondered what essay he was remembering. "He has agility. He _persists_. So many others have tried to fight the Dark Lord and failed because they did not have the ability to _continue_, when it came to it. But Potter does."

"I didn't know you thought that about him," Malfoy croaked.

_Yeah, me neither, _Harry thought in astonishment, his head whirling.

"I do," Snape said, and leaned his head back against the wall and shut his eyes. He didn't seem to care about the dirt getting into his hair, but then, Harry thought, he'd had so much grease and muck in his hair already, what were a few more particles of dirt? "If you will be quiet, I will tell you what else I think about him."

Malfoy opened his mouth, then flushed and bit his lower lip. Snape went on being quiet, and Malfoy went on fidgeting, until he at last seemed to convince himself that it _would _be better to keep still than to encourage Snape not to speak. Almost the moment he settled back against the wall, Snape began to, his words low and swelling up in power as Harry listened. He might have sensed his future audience after all and wanted to make sure that Harry heard all the sharp edges to the consonants, all the blur of the vowels.

"He is beautiful, in his own way. Not the hair, not the glasses, not the eyes-well, the eyes, one could make a case for. But with the sort of inner glow that we so rarely have, which draws people."

"Who's the _we_?" Malfoy sneered. "Slytherins? I don't believe that. Daphne's pretty enough, and so am I, and my mother, and the Dark Lord was handsome when he was young, you showed me that picture-"

"No," Snape said. "I meant those in service to someone else, or in rulership, those who must be masters or slaves. The independence of someone who needs neither. Albus had that glow, but tarnished, because in later years he took me as a servant, and used others that way. But at his best, he had need of no one else to stand for him, and no need to serve."

Harry blinked. It was true that he'd never thought much about having servants, and he'd _never _wanted to be a Dark Lord. But he'd had to obey rules plenty of times, like when he was a student or living at the Dursleys.

"Potter is just stubborn and defies the rules, is that what you're saying?" Malfoy asked, echoing Harry's thoughts.

Snape opened his eyes. Once again, Harry didn't know if he read the light in them correctly, but this time, he had something else he could use to judge-namely, the way Malfoy flinched back from the light in them so fast that he slammed his back into the wall.

"I am saying more than that," Snape said, and his voice had dropped to a rumble. "Something that perhaps you are too young to understand, something that perhaps I should not have tried to explain, but I will, because I wish to and no one otherwise will have the chance to hear it.

"Potter does not think himself above others. He allows his friends to relate to him as equals. And he does not _desire _to be above others. The desire for lordship that runs through the veins of the Dark Lord is foreign to him.

"Nor does he desire to serve. Chains are comforting, Draco, or your father would never have surrendered to them. They give the limits one walks within, the rules that one can use to cut others with when they disobey them, and inferiors that one can triumph over. But Potter has no need of them. That stubborn self-reliance is a weakness in a situation like Hogwarts, but a strength in much of the rest of his life. He will not go to others for help unless he thinks he can trust them, but in such ways he avoids the poisoned snares that took us in."

Malfoy closed his eyes and bowed his head. That must be a more personal reference than it sounded like, Harry decided. He didn't think it was specific enough. Then again, he wasn't inside Malfoy's head and didn't know what would make it personal enough for him to react to.

"I never thought about that," Malfoy whispered. "Where are you getting this? I heard you rant against him as stubborn and arrogant often enough."

"I did not desire to look closely enough," Snape answered. "And I could justify that desire because of the role I had to play as the Dark Lord's spy. Why bother to understand the Boy-Who-Lived when that understanding might turn to a weapon in the Dark Lord's hands, if I reported too truthfully?

"But now, I can admit it, and say I admire him for it." Snape settled more firmly against the wall, as though he had to hold it up with his shoulders. Staring at him, Harry thought, even before he heard him say it, that that meant the next thing he was going to say would be more difficult than most for him.

"And I could wish that he would teach me the trick of it."

Then the door slammed, and the memory whirled Harry out of there, and he found himself standing in the dark room filled with shining mist again. The wind had ceased to blow, and he understood that. Snape's power was no longer assisting his Legilimency. He would need to leave Snape's mind soon, as remaining here would mean ripping it apart.

And Harry wasn't sure he would have wanted to remain there, anyway, even if he could do it without hurting Snape and if it meant learning more secrets. He had learned enough right now to involve him in a whirlwind that ripped through his mind, and he wanted time to think about it.

He closed his eyes, and felt the mist draw him back, and up, and out.

* * *

"I haven't yet taught you the trick of it."

Severus opened his eyes slowly. He had a headache nipping at his temples, a sharp pain that would grow with time, but he did not hurt as badly as he had expected to. Potter had not lashed out in his surprise and ripped the mental shields around him, then. Good.

He watched Draco from the corner of his eye, starting as he no doubt recognized the phrase and connected it to their time in the dungeons, but what he _saw _was Potter, leaning forwards and staring at him with emerald eyes.

"You wanted to be free, neither master nor servant," Potter whispered. "But you set yourself up with the Ashborn and as master over Draco, and you haven't worked yourself out yet. Because freeing them and freeing yourself might mean they would hate you and you couldn't guard yourself from your enemies."

Severus inclined his head. It seemed Potter had not yet grasped the truth beneath the admiration and Severus's admissions in the dungeons, which-Severus could not help but be relieved about. Yes, he might want the man Potter had become, but he was still not sure how that man would react to the news.

"I'll try," Potter said. "Not necessarily for you. But because Draco and the Ashborn deserve better."

Severus nodded once more. Then he sat back and watched Potter as he left the room, his mouth violently twitching at one corner, his eyes almost closed.

"What did you _show _him?" Draco whispered as the door of the lab shut behind the man who had been more of a burning beacon to Severus than he had ever acknowledged before this day.

Severus glanced at him. "The truth."


	22. Coming to Terms

Thank you again for all the reviews!

_Chapter Twenty-Two—Coming to Terms_

Harry stepped into his rooms and shut the door behind him. He wondered for a moment if Bellatrix had followed him, but no, he couldn't remember her coming from the gardens or being with him when he went to Snape's lab. Then he dismissed those stupid thoughts and turned to face the less stupid ones that he had to deal with.

_Or__ maybe __they__'__re __not __less__ stupid,__ come__ to __think__ of __it._

Snape admired him. Snape thought he was a hero. Snape had, at one point, left him alone instead of interrupting Harry's mourning although Harry thought it was exactly the kind of dickish thing Snape would do.

Snape had looked at him the night of Dumbledore's death as though he wanted to fight Harry, or eat his power, or…

Harry winced. He didn't like the direction his thoughts were taking, but he had faced hard things during the war. He could make himself face these thoughts, too.

As if he wanted to fuck Harry.

_Well,__ you__ know__ he__'__s__ attracted__ to __men,__ since__ you __know__ that__ he__'__s__ fucking__ Draco.__ And __younger__ men, __too._

Harry let out a gusty sigh and pushed his hair back from his forehead with a shaking hand. That didn't really make sense, though, not with all the other memories he had seen and the context of _that_ particular one. Snape wanted Harry to stop calling him a coward and stop using the spells he'd made up. Maybe he wanted his power, too. That was different from wanting his body.

Besides, how was Snape's regard for Harry's mum supposed to fit into all of this?

Harry shook his head. It was getting too weird and stupid in here, definitely. He needed something else to think about, something that would distract him from lies that couldn't possibly be true.

Corners provided it, though probably accidentally. "I don't like either of them much," he said, and his tongue flickered. "But more than I did."

Harry paused and turned towards him, smiling in spite of himself. He trusted Corners's instincts where he wouldn't really have trusted his own. "Do you? Why? I know that Draco hasn't tried to talk to you since that night when you sang for him."

"Why should I want them to talk to me? I have you." Corners rose out of the cup, curling around himself in a way that made him look like the twisted stem of a bouquet. "But I do not like them blaming you and yelling at you, and there has been less of that. That the larger one let you into his mind is a good sign." Then he paused, and his tongue flickered out so it touched Harry's temple, a brief spot, there and gone, of wetness. "But you don't seem to like it. You are not as happy as I thought you would be."

Harry sighed and sat down on the bed. _Fine,__ the __distraction __isn__'__t __going __to__ last__ that __long__ after __all. _Maybe it was a good thing, as many barriers as he and Snape and Draco already had up between them. "Well, I don't know." He sought for a way to explain it, and finally said, "Corners, how do you—how do the Water People—mate?"

Corners curled his head up into what looked like a knot on the end of his neck. "Easily," he said. "When we discover someone we find interesting, we blend our wills. Each impulse goes out into the world and produces a new one of the Water People. It is the will and the water that we are made of, nothing else."

"So there's always two children?" Harry asked.

Corners repeated the word, "Children," in puzzlement, and Harry wondered if he had no equivalent for it in Parseltongue, since it sounded like his people didn't lay eggs. But then he nodded and said, "Yes, you would say that. Children. I can have children whenever I want." He paused and tilted his head. "Is that the source of your anger? Do you wish to have children with these two and they will not agree?"

Harry choked, and wished for a moment that Snape had been in the room. Of course, he would also have to wish that Snape could have understood Parseltongue, and wouldn't have killed him out of rage and embarrassment.

"No," he said, having to repeat the word when Corners's eyes flared with harsh light. His mouth was too choked with laughter to get the accent in Parseltongue right. "Not really. But I was enemies with them for a while, and now I don't know about how I feel about them." He hesitated, but, well, it wasn't like Corners was going to go around confessing to Snape about this, or that anyone would understand him if he tried. "I think the tall one wants to mate with me, though. Not to have children, but just to do it."

Corners uttered a thoughtful noise that sounded like a stopped-up sink. "Yes, that makes sense. Sometimes it can be a pleasure of its own to mingle with someone who has a will and thoughts like yours." He twisted his head down again. "But I thought the tall one did not have a will and thoughts like yours."

Harry sighed. "He doesn't. I'm trying to understand him, and I found that desire in his mind. Now I don't know how to deal with it."

"Mate with him," Corners said, "if it would bring you pleasure. Or don't."

He sounded so baffled that Harry had to smile. "It's a little more complicated than that for a human," he said.

"Because of the children?"

Harry shook his head. "They tried to kill me, or at least I thought they did," he said. "They fought on the opposite side of a war from me, and they took me away from my friends because they wanted to secure the future of their own—kind." He wasn't sure that Corners would understand the concept of the Ashborn without more explanation than Harry wanted to give it right now. For that matter, he wasn't sure but that he should have explained the concept of war. "I find it hard to feel kind to them. But now I've learned that one of them wants to be my friend, and one of them wants to mate with me. It's hard to understand."

"You're kinder than they are," Corners said. "Friendlier. It would be stranger if you wanted them back, but it's easy to understand why they want you."

Harry chuckled in spite of himself, wondering what Malfoy would think if he heard that. "Then you think I should leave them?"

"You want to leave anyway." Corners used that long wet tongue to touch Harry's cheek this time. "You can leave, and then come back. I think you'll have to come back anyway, won't you, if I understand the terms of the bargain correctly?" He had the polite tone in his voice that Harry had heard more than once when he discussed things Harry did. He thought they were odd and didn't understand them, but he would put up with them like someone putting up with a friend's strange hobbies.

"Yes," Harry said, and sat up. "You think I should tell them that I want to leave, then?"

"It would make you decide," Corners said. "If they want you and don't say it, it might make _them_ decide. That would be good, because then you would have something definite to cling to. At the moment, you're trickling all over the place like someone young who's just wandered into a swamp."

Harry smiled, and wondered again what Malfoy would make of Corners and his metaphors. It bothered him, a bit, when he realized how badly he wanted to ask.

Well, he could do that later. He nodded. "I think you're right. We have to press this at least a bit, because otherwise I'll be stuck here forever, if only because of my own compassion. I'll tell Snape in the morning."

* * *

Draco opened his eyes in the Forest clearing and sighed when he once again found Laughter waiting for him. The only time he had missed a meeting with Draco was the night of the full moon, and Draco thought himself a little stupid for trying to arrange one then, in hindsight. Laughter inclined his head now and flashed his teeth, bright and nearly as pale as the moonlight. He wasn't a wolf, of course, Draco knew, but it was only three days past the full moon, and he still flowed and stretched restlessly instead of sitting still the way he usually did, as if he had strong memories of running through the Forest on four legs.

"Little negotiator," Laughter said. "We have heard news from the centaurs."

"Oh?" Draco asked. He thought it best to use the neutral expression instead of criticize. After all, he had no idea how the werewolves had got the news from the centaurs. Probably by listening to their conversations while hidden in the undergrowth, but he had done worse things himself.

"They said that Harry Potter is leaving the alliance," Laughter said, and leaned forwards to peer at him when Draco didn't react. "The alliance that you are helping to build with us, the one that the centaurs joined you to exploit. Is that true?"

"That they joined us to exploit it?" Draco automatically shook his head. "Oh, surely not. There must be other reasons."

"Little negotiator," Laughter said, and his voice had grown very quiet. "I am giving you a chance to explain. You would be wise not to waste it."

Draco sighed and sat back in the grass, watching the way that Laughter's hands—paws, he wanted to call them, but there was no hair there, there only looked as if there _should _be—rolled and danced through it. "Yes, he's leaving," he said. "He's still going to remain bound to us nominally, but I don't think he'll spend as much time with us as he did. And he's told the centaurs that he can't keep the promise he made about guaranteeing them aid."

Laughter's eyes grew brighter, and he leaned back on his haunches, swishing his foot in front of him the way he had made his hand travel. "That would explain some things," he said, and waved his hand when Draco glanced at him. "Some rumors that have reached us. And it would mean that my reluctance to join the alliance until we could hammer out something mutually agreeable to everyone is justified after all."

Draco licked his lips. "Well," he said after a moment. "I mean. I can continue negotiating with you, but if you think that Harry Potter has to be part of the alliance for it to matter, then I'm afraid I can't oblige you."

Again, as had happened so many times in the past, Laughter's tongue spilled over his teeth. "No," he said. "It simply means that the humans in the alliance whom we know are more important now, rather than less. Much hinges on your promises, little negotiator." He leaned forwards. "I hope you are fond of keeping them."

Draco lifted his head and nodded. He had a lingering stiffness in the back of his neck that came from the way he always hunched over when he was here, waiting for someone or some_thing_ to spring on his back and put an end to him, but he wouldn't make a huge deal of that. "I want someone to see me as important as Potter," he said, telling the truth, because he knew Laughter could probably smell it on him. "This feels like my chance."

Laughter's smile was slower this time, and lacked the edge of cruelty that Draco had sometimes sensed in him before. "Well. I do. Now. Tell me what you think of my proposal that you would help in setting boundaries between my pack and the centaurs."

Draco released his breath slowly. This was a thorny issue, and one that he thought he was unable to make firm promises on, because the centaurs were their allies, too, or should be.

But maybe they wouldn't be after Potter walked away. And someone wanted Draco's decision, not Severus's or Potter's. He was the one who had initiated the negotiation with the werewolves.

He leaned forwards and began to speak.

* * *

Severus leaned back and blew on the ink in the parchment in front of him, out of habit. The ink he used now dried instantly, thanks to a potion of his own invention, but he had spent years using the kind that didn't.

He had written out the new Vows that he wanted to make to Potter, the ones that would soften and somewhat bend the iron hold of the first set. He was doing what he had always said that he would not: bowing his head to a new master now that the Dark Lord and Albus were dead, giving in to what someone else had asked of him.

For a moment, the panic gripped him so hard that he thought it would wrench the breath from his throat.

Then he shook his head.

No. The freedom he thought he had experienced after the Dark Lord died was illusory. He had not waited a month before he began to locate the Death Eaters and bend their minds to his. Freedom that depended on enslaving others was a delusion, and if he could take the place of one of his masters, that was not the same as not having one. He made himself the owner of the Ashborn, and the slave of their concerns.

Severus closed his eyes and reached out into the dark plain that he thought of his mind as, sometimes—most often when it was in contact with the Ashborn. He watched the dark threads thrumming around him, some thinner than others. It took more effort to tame someone relatively sane, like Yaxley, than to step into a hole in someone's mind and set himself up as the new Lord, the way he had for Bellatrix, or the leader of the pack, as he had for Greyback.

But the outcome was the same in any case. Instant, total obedience. They would do the tasks he set for them, and do them well, and understand the unspoken requests he might have made, because they always thrummed through the link. He could see through their eyes, hear through their ears, and reach out to them no matter where they traveled.

It was not what he had wanted. What he wanted was peace, solitude, and power to defend himself. But he had convinced himself that he needed a fortress and a coterie of soldiers to do that.

He had grown the Ashborn around himself as a turtle would grow the shell. And he ventured into the outside world less than a turtle did, come to that. At least a turtle could count on the wind blowing in its face and the contact its feet had with the ground. Severus had not done even his own ingredients-hunting in months. When he could take over the senses of anyone else hunting on his orders, it didn't matter if they didn't have his expertise. He could detect in an instant what the plant felt like against his palm, the rustling of silky leaves or dry ones, and the consistency of sap from a broken stem.

But that was not life. It was not the life he had said he wanted in the cell, and which he thought Draco in that time and moment had expected to see him pursue.

Severus wanted to see himself reflected in Draco's eyes as worthy, and in Potter's. And he would never have what he wanted if he held back and hid in the safety he had grown around himself, which was not very real, after all.

"Snape."

Potter had stepped into the room, and if he had knocked, Severus had not heard him. A short time ago, that revelation would have had him reaching for his wand, because how could he defend himself against an enemy who could so easily sneak up on him?

Now he simply nodded to Potter and gestured to the chair in front of him, and Potter took it, watching him as wordlessly. Severus quelled the temptation to tap his fingers and stared back at Potter, who narrowed his eyes as though he was fighting off a strong wind, or strong sun.

"I came to see you because I want you to let me go," Potter said at last, and then stopped, as if he hadn't meant to make his voice come out as loud as that, almost a shout. He sighed, and continued in a slightly softer tone. "On the first of my visits to my friends, or whatever we're going to call them officially. I want you to—bend the Vows, or replace them, or whatever you're going to do. You've proven yourself sincere with one thing, letting me see inside your mind. But that's the kind of proof that's only going to satisfy _me_. You have to let me leave if you're going to satisfy my friends."

Severus would have liked to sneer and say that he had no intention, or wish, or need, of satisfying Potter's friends. But he wanted the kind of peace between them that would only come when Potter was happy with what he had done, and pleasing the man's friends was part of that.

"I have a new set of Vows written out," he said, and pushed the parchment across the table to Potter.

Potter picked it up and read, his eyes narrowing behind his glasses in disbelief. Severus watched him, and wondered what Potter would say if told that he should remove his glasses, because his eyes were beautiful.

_Probably __that __he__ couldn__'__t __see__ anything __without__ them, __or __something __else __rather __literal __and __point-missing,_ Severus thought, and shook his head.

Potter looked up just in time to catch the motion, and clenched his hand down on the parchment. "Excuse me for taking some time to absorb the information and look for traps in the wording," he said.

"My own thoughts made me react that way, not your actions," Severus said.

Potter opened his mouth as if to object to that careful phrasing, and then shut it again. He did gave Severus a cautious look as he turned back to the Vows, perhaps because the thought of someone being pleasant to him was foreign.

_Well,__yes,_Severus thought then, his mind burning now with the memories that he had seen in Potter's mind. _You __of __all __people __should __know__ that __a__ childhood__ like __Potter__'__s __does __not __contribute __to __much __self-confidence __or __expectation__ that __the__ world __will __be __nice __to__ you._

Except that he had not had the attention Potter had received in childhood to balance his own distrust of the world…

Severus shook his head again. He could still be hanged by his old perceptions, it seemed, when he wasn't paying attention. No. This was the real thing, the image of Potter that he had now, and he was determined to cling to it, as best he could.

"You would be willing to let me stay away longer than a week?" Potter had laid the parchment down and was staring at him again.

"Summoning you back too often would promote fits of complaining," Severus said dryly. "Not what I am _trying _to promote."

"And what is that?" Potter shoved his glasses up his nose with a shaking hand that Severus thought he might have preferred to use to strangle someone.

"You know by now," Severus said, not blinking.

"I want to hear you say it."

Severus sighed. "Peace between us. Lasting peace between the factions we lead, even if something changes as far as the—free will of one of those factions. Trust. Admiration. Truth. I cannot say anything more than that, because if you learned anything in my mind, you should have learned that I _don__'__t_ feel friendship for you, as I said that I didn't."

"Yeah, you just lust after me," Potter snapped.

Severus felt the tremor that passed through his body, urging him to pick up his wand and strike, or cruel words and do the same thing. If someone found a weak place in his shields, the only thing to do was attack them so they would not further exploit the flaw and open it—

No, he could not do that, or the effort he had put into this so far, letting Potter read his mind and writing the new set of Vows, would go for nothing. He would not allow that to happen. Severus therefore concentrated on his breathing for a few moments and then nodded.

"One could put it like that," he murmured. "I would choose different words, but it is the truth. I am curious that you sensed it," he added. "The memory I let you see of the cell would have confirmed rather different ideas, I should think."

"It wasn't that one," Potter said, with a thickness in his voice that made Severus think he might not have confronted that possible set of ideas yet. "It was the one before, when you were shooting spells at me the night you killed Dumbledore."

Severus held back what he could have said about Albus, and instead studied the way that Potter's hands clenched in his lap and his eyes avoided Severus's. "Ah," he said at last. "And you saw the longing I have for your power and translated that into longing for your body."

Potter shot him a quick look. "It's _not _that, then?"

"I did not say that," Severus retorted, and sighed when Potter looked unconvinced. "Simply that I did not expect you to pick up on it so quickly, and not from that memory. I thought it would mean more to you that I saw you as a hero."

"So many people have," Potter said, and his voice shifted keys, into one Severus had heard before. "That's not new or surprising."

"I am not a mindless hero-worshiper," Severus said, and his own voice shifted, too, because he had not been able to help it. Potter wanted truth? He would have it. "I am not someone who sat back and expected you to save them, hailing you as a hero only when things were absolutely safe and the Dark Lord was dead. I am someone who _was _on the front lines, someone who _did _give you the support you needed, and I am telling you that I admire you when you thought I despised you. I know now you are not a spoiled child, or the son of a bully who caused pain to me because you wished to. What I did in treating you as the enemy from the first day, and prejudicing you against me when we should have worked together, was wrong. I can admit that. I can say that you were a beacon that burned for me, and it is true. But do not lump me in with the others who say you are a hero and mean by that only that you warded them from a threat that they were too cowardly to face head-on."

Potter stared at him, mouth slightly open. Severus leaned back in his seat and gave him an even look. He had nothing else to say. It was possible that Potter would reject him after all, and the revelations that Severus could give him. In that case, there was nothing else Severus could do. There _were _no other emotions under this, no secrets to unravel.

If Potter rejected him, perhaps it would even be the repayment he deserved after years of tormenting him in school.

But Severus had not fawned in the past, and he would not beg now. He sat still and aloof, waiting for Potter to decide what he wanted to believe, and let him make the decision on his own.

* * *

Harry let go of the arm of his chair and made sure that he wasn't crumpling the piece of parchment Snape had handed him which had the new Vows written on it. He was shaking with fine tremors, but he shouldn't be. He _shouldn__'__t_ be. He took a few quiet breaths and forced himself to focus on what was in front of him, glad for once that he hadn't brought Corners with him. Corners had coiled himself into the bottom of his cup that morning and become nothing more than a small splash of water to anyone watching. Harry suspected that was his version of sleep, and had left him to it.

Snape had said he wanted him. And said he wanted Harry to be his hero.

No. Not exactly. In the memory, he had told Malfoy that he expected Harry would rescue them because he had qualities no one else did. And it wasn't a personal rescue he had expected, only the end of Voldemort. After that, as he had shown to Harry, he could manage quite well on his own.

If he was going to get angry about something, Harry wanted it to be _real_. So he looked back up at Snape and said, "And do you still admire me, now that the war is over and you don't have any more need of a hero?"

Snape's mouth twisted. "Yes," he said, and Harry had the distinct impression that that wasn't the question Snape would have preferred him to ask. _Well, __too __bad._ "You achieved the impossible. You sacrificed yourself to come to the Ashborn. You are still fighting for the peace of the world and the freedom of those who surround you." His eyes closed in a slow blink. Harry doubted he would have noticed it was that slow if he hadn't been watching Snape intently. "And I told you, I want someone who can teach me to live without being a master or a slave. You continue to do that."

Harry sat still for a moment. Then he nodded. "And would you be willing to give up the Ashborn if I agreed to teach you how to do that?" he asked.

Snape sneered at him. "I would not make such a condition," he said. "I do not know if you can teach me anything, or would. That is why the new Vows do not say anything about it."

"I know what the new Vows say," Harry snapped back at him. "I just spent ten minutes reading them. But all it says is that I can't use violent means to free the Ashborn, and you can't use violent means to force me to return, and that I can visit my friends instead of having to stay in the fortress the whole time. It could have been two Vows instead of six if your bloody paranoid mind didn't need to cover all the angles."

"You would have required more of the same wording if I had not included it," Snape reminded him, and leaned forwards. "I want to learn from you. I do not know if you can teach me," he repeated. "It may be something innate in you, not a virtue that you can give others."

"We have no idea if—"

"Precisely," Snape said. "I have made enough Vows already. I know what uncertainty does to me when I am under them. I see no reason to _induce _that uncertainty when we will have to wait and know more about whether you can teach this to us."

"Us?" Harry said, and used the word to balance himself. "Then you want me to teach Draco the same things?"

"If you can teach them at all." Snape knotted his fingers across his belly, looking as if he didn't know what he wanted to say, or do. "I do not know—"

"Yes, you've said that already," Harry cut him off. He leaned in again. He half-expected to smell an unpleasant scent around Snape when he did, the medicinal scent of healing potions, but he didn't. Perhaps he hadn't been brewing that morning. Snape stared at him with narrowed eyes and didn't reply. "_Anyway._ What I mean is, will you relax your control over Draco enough for me to teach him? Can he be included in the lessons?"

* * *

_Another__ test. __Nearly __everything __he__ says __to __me__ is._

Still, Severus felt his muscles relax. He would not know what to do with a Potter who was _not_ constantly testing him, looking for ways to make him stumble or catch him in a lie. He nodded. "I would want Draco to learn the same thing. Lately, I have the impression that he is trying to make himself into someone who does not need a master, from the way he does not consult me, but I do not know if he could permanently escape the trap without help. He clung to me after the war, and he was proud, at first, to be taken into the service of the Dark Lord."

"So it's about giving both of you back your pride," Potter said, and stared at the text of the Vows, Severus thought, without seeing them.

A snort escaped Severus before he could stop it. "If _that_ is what you think, then I wonder you have the wit to put your clothes on in the morning. Both Draco and I have plenty of pride."

"Yeah, but it's the wrong kind." Potter was still looking at the Vows, as if thinking about ways to change them.

"What?" The word came out sharper than Severus would have liked. He coughed and straightened. "Explain."

Potter glanced up at him, eyes slightly narrowed, and then shook his head. "Hard to, but I'll try." He pulled off his glasses and cleaned them on his robes. His eyes were brilliant without them, Severus thought. Unshielded—no, not quite, but closer to it than usual. "You have the kind of pride that leads to vanity and being sure you're better than other people. But you can't make yourselves feel good without that constant comparison. What you need is the kind of pride that doesn't make you compare yourselves with other people, because you don't need to."

"Do we," Severus said, controlling the impulse to flick his voice out as a whip. He had, after all, asked Potter for lessons like these.

Potter nodded. "You need the same kind of lessons, but I think Malfoy's getting better at it. He didn't beg me to be his friend; he just walked away, and it's going to be up to me whether I'm his friend or not."

"And if he wanted to be more than your friend?" Severus murmured. He was not sure what he meant to do, set a cat among the pigeons or simply make sure that the two boys did not dance awkwardly around each other because Potter had not grasped that Draco might want him, as well.

Potter, though, simply blinked and seemed to ignore the tsunami of a blush that rose up his face. "Then I'll get to that when it happens," he said calmly. "That d-doesn't need to interfere with me teaching you."

"It should," Severus said. "It should add something to it. Once again, we are asking you for gifts and not giving them properly ourselves." He paused, but Potter simply watched him with his mouth open. "Do you trust me enough to accept something from me?" he added. "I know that my gifts before were not to your taste."

"It's not rich clothes I want," Potter said instantly. "I wouldn't accept them even from my friends. But my journey into your mind taught me I can trust you, yes."

_He__ lives __as __though __it __were__ natural __that __all __one__'__s__ emotions __be __on __the __surface __of __the __skin, __as __bright__ as __sunlight, _Severus thought, and wondered if Potter teaching him the proper kind of pride would entail learning that. He could hope not and suspect so at the same moment. "Then tell us what kind of gift would be acceptable to you."

Potter shook his head. "You already gave me what I wanted, a look inside your mind. And Draco's not pouring out everything to me and giving nothing in return, which was also what I wanted from him."

"We are asking for more and future concessions," Severus murmured. "Gifts given in the past do not serve. What do you want?"

Potter opened his mouth, and shut it. Severus nodded approval. Careful consideration in such a matter was important. And since Potter had had trouble deciding what he wanted in the first place, he would need time, perhaps, to consider his answer to a new version of the question.

Severus settled into the waiting posture he had used sometimes when sitting in the Dark Lord's circle—shoulders straight, eyes aimed at his target, head back—but he had never watched then with such a sense of keen interest and importance as he did now.

* * *

_What __do __I__ want?__ To __help __people.__ For__ him__ to __free __the __Ashborn. __I __already __said__ that._

But Snape wanted concrete, tangible things. Of course. Harry didn't know why he was surprised. He took a tight breath, released it. Sharp butterflies brewed in his stomach, banging their wings against his ribs.

All right. All right. He could do this. The worst that could happen was that he asked and Snape refused, right? Which he was good at. Harry shouldn't worry that Snape would let him do something really distressing or hurtful to Snape and Draco themselves just because he wanted to keep Harry here. Snape didn't have that kind of compassion.

He looked up. "I want you to release one Ashborn from your control," he said. "One you think you can trust not to go insane and try to kill everybody. Maybe you can never release someone like Bellatrix or Greyback, but I want someone free."

"May I defend myself if they turn on me, then?" Snape asked at once. "Or maintain enough control of their minds to subdue them if need be?"

Harry sighed. He hated all these nuances which came along and upset the neat things he wanted to ask for—

Which might be one reason that he was more at home in wars and grand gestures than trying to deal with the realities of day-to-day life among the people who'd followed him. They'd wanted him to make decisions after the war that he'd hesitated between because he knew they would upset _someone_, and wondered how long people would want to obey him when he couldn't satisfy anybody.

"Maintain control with different spells," he said. "Not mental control."

Snape nodded, as if that was reasonable. "Very well. Then I will do my best with Hilda Incognita. She is one of the older Death Eaters and did not glory in murder and torture as Bellatrix did. She also has no particular prejudice against half-bloods despite my being one."

"Well, we'll see how she feels after you free her from holding her mind captive," Harry muttered.

"Yes, we will," Snape said, and turned to the Vows. "Are these acceptable, or do you need them rewritten?'

"That's _it_?" Harry demanded. "No demurring because you don't want to free someone, no demanding that I ask for something else?"

"It would avail me little," Snape said, looking up. "I prefer not to waste the energy. And you should still seek Draco out, tell him what is happening, and ask him if he is happy with the terms of the bargain—or our gifts to each other, if you wish to put it that way."

Harry stared at him. "You're being _honest_," he said at last. "And it's sort of infuriating."

"I learned from the best teacher," Snape said, and tapped the parchment. "The Vows?"


	23. Seekers

Thank you again for all the reviews!

_Chapter Twenty-Three—Seekers_

"So I wanted to know something."

Draco grimaced and pushed his hair back out of his eyes. He'd slept late that morning, his head aching from the discussions with Laughter and questions about whether he'd done the right thing. He'd have to visit the centaurs later, and ask Severus what had happened between him and Potter in as much detail as he'd be willing to talk about it, and…

Then he opened his door to an insistent knocking he assumed was one of the Ashborn, and found Potter there instead. Potter, who was leaving. Potter, who his cat automaton silently rushed up to and inspected for a moment. Draco called the automaton back to him and stroked the sleek head, keeping one eye on Potter. He had only ordered the cat to do something like that when someone came to his rooms smelling of intense emotions that the cat's enchanted senses could detect. He wanted to know if Severus felt like that, and he knew that the Ashborn never would; even their anger if the fortress was attacked would only come from what Severus felt and echo it to that extent.

He had never expected Potter. That made Draco shake his head. _How thoroughly did I give up on him, from the minute he said he was leaving? _

"Listen," Potter said, and then glanced down the corridor and ran his hand through his hair as though he was afraid someone was going to catch him. That made Draco stare at him. Who, exactly, was Potter expecting? "I wanted to know what—Snape said something that makes no sense—can we go in your rooms and talk?"

Draco blew out an agitated breath, and the cat automaton took a step back. Draco murmured an order to it, and it retreated behind his legs, but kept watching Potter. Draco didn't know if he could subdue its protective instincts completely or not. He was torn sometimes between being glad that he couldn't and irritated that Severus would have made the beast that much independent of him.

"All right," he said at last, because while he didn't know if he was equal to deal with what Potter asked of him, he was _sure _he couldn't deal with it out in the corridor. "Come in."

Potter stepped past him, watching him with the same wary respect as the cat automaton. Draco blinked and shut the door. What _had _Severus said to Potter? Perhaps they had begun to renegotiate the Unbreakable Vows, but that was between the two of them, not something Potter should need to consult Draco for.

"You have nice rooms."

Draco opened his mouth to snap back, and then paused and shut it again. Potter had mumbled the words, his shoulders hunched as though he had wings that could keep him warm. Draco tempered his voice. "Thank you. Severus let me pick out the decorations, although I didn't design them, of course."

"Of course," Potter said, and then sighed and turned around. "It doesn't matter how much time I spend thinking about this, it isn't going to get easier," he mumbled, ducking his head. "Do you—Malfoy, do you like me?"

"Not when you're being a prat, but more than I did in school," Draco said, now wondering if he should try to use Legilimency on Potter—aggressive memories notwithstanding—and study him for a hint of a compulsion charm. Not that it would be like Severus to put one on someone in such a delicate situation. He favored gentle manipulations then, as Draco knew very well. He glanced down at the silver cat.

"No, I mean." Potter swallowed. Draco watched the motion of his throat and now wondered if he should check Potter for choking on a chicken bone. "Snape said that you—wanted me. Like, as a lover." Potter's cheeks were so bright with blood now that Draco could probably use them like a torch to read in the darkness.

The words caught up with Draco's ears, and he stared at Potter for a moment. Then he flung back his head and uttered a few barking laughs. Potter wrapped his arms around himself and blinked, like someone who'd just taken a Sobriety Potion.

"Right, right," he said. "I should have reckoned that Snape was joking. He probably wanted to feel less uncomfortable about having to change the Vows and yield something to me in the first place." He smiled at Draco and began to edge around him. "So we'll put this behind us and never think about it again, right?"

Draco narrowed his eyes and reached out with one hand, catching Potter's shoulder so he could hold him still. "Severus told you this?"

"Yes," Potter said, and gathered himself. "He told me that he wanted me, but he thought you did, too. So he was wrong about the second thing, and he might be wrong about the first, too. I mean, he's not—you're not sleeping together in the same way you used to, right?" Now his face was bright enough to make a noticeable difference in the way the room looked with the torches going. "So he's probably just lonely and—something about me reminds him of you."

Draco stared at him. Then he shook his head. "No," he said. "Severus is quick-witted enough to know what he wants now. It's the admission that startles me. But he's right about what he wants."

Potter nodded. He still looked as spooked as Draco thought the Dark Lord had ever made him. "But he wasn't right about you?"

"Sometimes," Draco said, "sometimes, although not always, Severus is observant, too. He mostly puts those observations to work hurting people," he had to add, because Potter would say it if he didn't. "But sometimes he sees what people want before they do themselves."

"But not in this case?"

Draco leaned forwards, bracing himself with one hand on Potter's face, and kissed him.

There was a long moment of stillness, probably because Potter stood there too stunned to move and Draco's mouth was still telling him what he was tasting, the warmth of Potter's lips and the way they slipped open. When his tongue entered Potter's mouth, there was a deeper warmth, and a taste of salt and copper, and the scrape of teeth that made Draco shiver as if he'd never kissed someone before.

But of course he had. Severus, again and again, and even a few people back at Hogwarts, although of course none of them had the experience and the brilliance with kisses that Severus did. This time, though, it was different, the taste a little different, the way Potter had stiffened himself as though to resist an undertow dragging him away was bloody damn unique, and the way a tongue lay cool and still under his made Draco poke and prod more. The people he kissed before now had always _responded, _even Severus when he was busy with a potion and had kissed back to get Draco out of the way before he ruined something.

Potter closed his eyes. That could be a positive change, Draco thought, clear-headed and not clear-headed, probing some more. He leaned forwards, and Potter swayed back before him, and then caught himself on the edge of the bed. Draco let his hips come to rest against Potter's, and Potter gasped, and then they tumbled the short distance down. Draco managed to catch himself with one hip and one elbow so he didn't land on Potter's chest and knock all the breath out of him at once.

Potter blew and snorted up at him, eyes so brilliant a green and so wide that Draco thought he probably couldn't see. Draco leaned down and kissed him some more, gentle, not greedy. He thought this was good, but it might not be good for Potter, and it might not be something he would ever get to taste again.

Which was too bad, because Severus had been right. Of course he had. Draco liked the taste of men, and he had admired Potter's eyes and Quidditch skill and Parseltongue abilities and bloody _luck _even before the war, and since then, Potter had helped him and worried about him and tried to get him to stand up for himself. It wasn't burning and all-consuming yet, the way Draco thought Severus's emotions might be, but it was nice.

And he was hard, and he could feel Potter squirming beneath him, probably in the attempt to keep Draco from noticing the same thing about him, and he had to smile and run a hand down to squeeze, gently.

Potter levitated off the bed, or tried, and Draco found Potter's hands pushing at his chest. He leaned back and broke the kiss. There was no reason not to. If Potter didn't want this, then Draco wouldn't force him. And if he did, then it would probably take him some time to admit it to himself. Draco tried to remember if Potter had ever even dated someone before the war, and could only come up with a time or two when he might have seen Potter holding the She-Weasel's hand. Even that was blurred with time and distance—not a surprise, considering what Draco had had to do during sixth year.

"I," Potter said, and closed his eyes and lay there panting for a few minutes. Now that Draco was no longer leaning above him, he seemed in no hurry to get off the bed. He did turn his head to the side, though, and his tongue fell out of his mouth as though he was seeking a way to get more air. Draco hooked his fingers firmly into his trouser legs and didn't think about the way he would like to slide his fingers into Potter's mouth.

Well, not very much.

"If you let that change your mind about coming back sometimes now you have your freedom," he said, "I'm going to hex you."

"No," Potter said, and gulped noisily, and opened his eyes. He still couldn't hold Draco's gaze for more than a minute or so before his eyes slid away and he flushed in a long, sliding tide of red from neck to forehead. Draco moved to the side and continued watching him. He would make it as easy as he could for Potter, but there was no law against watching, and Potter might only get more embarrassed if he turned away. "That's—that's settled. The Unbreakable Vows have been changed, and we'll swear the new ones later."

"Good," Draco said. "Then your friends are coming to visit tomorrow and take you back with them? Or you're going to Apparate to them?"

Potter looked less like he wanted to burrow out of the room or hex Draco, now, which was a good thing. "I don't know," he said. "I suspect I'll have to firecall them tonight and see what they want to do."

Draco nodded. "You could use my fire, if Severus is unreasonable about letting you have one," he offered.

"I don't," Potter said, and then seemed to reconsider whatever statement he was about to offer about Severus's preferences. "Thanks," he said instead, pushing those horrible glasses up his nose. "Malfoy?"

"Hmm?" Draco studied the red that still shone on the side of Potter's neck. He had caused that. Or at least his words had.

"Why? I mean, I know Snape's explanation, I saw part of it in his memories. But you didn't have the reasons that he did to have faith in me, or protect me, or want me to live." Potter stared at him. "So why want me?"

Draco smiled. "Why, Potter, I've noticed something you haven't?" he asked. "In this case, it's that lust doesn't always have a reason. I find you attractive, and now I find you decent instead of a git, after living with you for a little while. You still make me angry, but not all the time. And I have Severus's permission to snog you. Hell if I wouldn't, if only to see what it was like to snog someone else."

"Huh," Potter said, and stood up and smoothed down his shirt. Draco thought that was the last thing he should be worrying about, with his hair a disaster area the way it was, but then, Potter was probably used to his hair looking that way. Draco leaned back on the bed and watched him in a leisurely way as he reached for the doorknob.

Potter paused, without looking back over his shoulder. Draco raised his eyebrows. If Potter had gathered up enough courage to say something else about what had transpired, then that was news to Draco.

"I—how was I?" Potter blurted, and then flinched as if he'd have liked to smack himself in the face, at the very least.

"Better than I expected," Draco said, and let a hint of teasing into his voice. "Not a patch on Severus, of course, but I've been attracted to him for a longer time, and he's had more experience. Try it some more and you could become as good as he is."

For a long moment, Potter's neck twitched, and Draco was _sure _Potter would whip his head around and give him at least one good glare in response. But then Potter shook his head and went through the door, and Draco was left to an empty bed. He lay down on it and glanced around. No, nothing urgent. He couldn't meet the centaurs right now, not when he was still flushed, and Potter wouldn't leave until later in the day, or tomorrow, perhaps.

He set the cat automaton to guard the door and then lay back on his pillows, sliding his hand into his trousers and closing his eyes. He'd told the truth when he told Potter that Severus snogged better—he _did _have loads more experience, and Draco had spent a much longer time wondering what Severus's mouth would taste like—but he could imagine Potter's flushed cheeks and reluctant tongue until he came, at least.

And he could do it without constant questioning and worrying about what Severus would say first, which made this a vast improvement over how he would have felt and acted a few weeks ago. Potter had given him that much.

* * *

Harry shut the door of his quarters behind him, and considered bolting it. Then he shook his head. No, Snape probably had wards up that would inform him when someone did something like that and send Bellatrix to break the door down. Harry settled for sitting down on his bed and staring at the cup with Corners asleep in the bottom of it. He wanted to talk, he wanted to ask questions, but on the other hand—

Well, on the other hand, given what Corners seemed to think about human mating and how easy it should be, he might not be able to offer good advice, after all.

Harry groaned and put his hands over his face. Then he took them off again. With skin pressed so close to skin that way, it was too easy to conjure Malfoy's warm mouth and sliding tongue and flushed cheeks.

It was—

Well, all right, it hadn't been horrible. Nothing like the kisses he had shared with Ginny, of course, because Ginny and Malfoy were different people, and Harry had actually known the kisses with Ginny were coming and had time to prepare himself for them and wonder if he was a horrible person for not returning them properly. Or, well, what he thought was properly. His tongue always seemed clumsy, and he didn't kiss deeply enough or well enough or with the right amount of passion. Ginny would pull away from him smiling and laughing, though, her hair tumbled around her, and her hands darting out to hold his arms and pull him closer. Harry didn't think she'd do that if he disgusted her. She was too honest.

Whereas, with Malfoy, Harry hadn't worried about any of that because Malfoy had kissed him first, and he hadn't known it was coming. And Malfoy had backed off when he really pushed.

Harry flung an arm across his forehead and closed his eyes. It had taken him forever to push, though. Or, at least, it seemed like that to him when he thought about it. He really wasn't sure. He didn't know anything.

He wondered how Snape would kiss, if it would be like Malfoy's kisses. They were lovers, so they must have taught each other something about how to kiss, right? Or Snape would have taught Malfoy, holding his face close to him, using those long slender fingers for something besides stirring potions for once, his breath traveling hoarsely in and out of his mouth—

Harry shuddered and shook his head. He really _shouldn't _be thinking about this. No, he shouldn't, no matter what his body muttered at him. He wasn't going to have Snape and Malfoy as lovers. They had admitted they wanted him, but he was leaving and living with other people, and he wouldn't be coming back for a month.

_And when you come back? _

By the time he came back, Harry thought, Snape and Malfoy would probably be over him. Snape would have decided it was a bad idea to admit as much as he had to Harry about what attracted him to Harry, and retreated into his lab. Malfoy would probably be Snape's slave again, and he—

Harry hissed between his teeth. He was surprised how much those two visions disturbed him, and if the idea that Malfoy would lose his new self-confidence was twice as disturbing as the other, still. He didn't want Snape to become a bitter, reclusive Potions master again, if only because the Ashborn and Malfoy would suffer for it.

_It isn't your job to save them, Harry._

But if he wanted to come back, then the least he could do was send owls and make some firecalls before then, to learn how Snape and Malfoy were doing, and how the experiment with freeing the solitary Ashborn was going.

Harry relaxed and sat up. That was the way he would do it, then. Checking on them occasionally, making sure that he had something to come back to, that all his work hadn't been utterly wasted. It was a good beginning. He reached out for Corners's cup and rapped the side of it. The water inside stirred and bubbled, and then the horse-like head rose and the large, clear eyes stared at him.

"Corners?" Harry asked. "We're going home."

* * *

Severus watched Granger and Weasley far more than Potter as they marched out to the stone table set up in front of the fortress, on a hill that still had more than a touch of green. The centaurs stood at a distance, watching them. Severus didn't recall inviting them, but decided it wouldn't do harm to have them see this. Perhaps they would leave when Potter did, perhaps they would stay, but either way, they would see that it was not a joke that Potter was going.

Potter avoided his eyes and Draco's. He looked down at his parchment copy of the Vows instead, and fussed with his collar and robes when he thought he could get away with it. Granger stood, steel-eyed, at his shoulder, and Weasley kept one hand on Potter's arm at all times. Severus was surprised to realize how hard that hand was to deal with. He had to look away more than once, and think of numerous ingredients for the Draught of Living Death before he could calm his breathing.

"Severus?"

That was Draco, close at his side, closer than the Ashborn guards. Severus had brought those with him because it would take too much work to adjust the links in their minds so that they would be comfortable letting him out of sight, but he had ordered them to stand back from the table, because of Granger. Draco had no such bidding, and might have ignored it if he did. He was behind Severus's right shoulder and staring openly at Potter.

Potter kept his head down as much to avoid Draco's gaze as Severus's own, perhaps, Severus thought.

"What is it?" he whispered back, concealing the words under the crackle of paper as they shifted their copies of the Vows in front of them, and Granger pretended to smile, and Weasley did no such thing.

"I kissed Potter," Draco said. "I think you were right about my wanting him, although I would have preferred to _know _first if you were going to say something like that." He narrowed his eyes in Severus's direction. "And he tasted bloody good, as a matter of fact."

Severus felt a slow, copper-like coil in his gut, but he didn't know which man he was jealous of. He shook his head and reminded himself that Draco would stay here, and Potter would come back. "Did he," he said. "Better than me?"

"Different," Draco said, and his hand moved, out of sight behind the chair and Severus's robes, caressing the small of his back. "Because you're different people, and that is not surprising. Or should not be," he added, with a voice as small and prim as his mouth had suddenly become.

Severus looked up. The cup that Potter's snake stayed in had floated to his right hand, which meant they were done with waiting. He bent his head to Potter, and then picked up his copy of the Vows. "Who acts as Bonder?" he asked, although of course he knew who it would be. There was only one person there with wand already drawn and the look on her face that made him sure she would volunteer.

Granger moved forwards a single pace and inclined her head back to him. She said nothing. Well, technically the Bonder did not have to. It was only the consent of the one taking the altered Vows that was required.

Severus turned back to Potter. He met Severus's eyes with much the same glittering glass façade he had used when he first came to the Ashborn. Severus thought of protesting, and did not. He knew the ways to make it shatter, and it seemed Draco had found one as well. When Potter came back for his next visit would be soon enough.

"You are satisfied with these Vows?" he asked. Potter nodded. Someone else was determined to say nothing until he had to. Well. Severus folded his hands in front of him. "I am as well. Then we will begin."

This time, when Potter's hand clenched his own, Severus could feel the bones and the slenderness of his fingers. Strange, that such fingers should have wielded the wand that killed the Dark Lord. But Severus had always believed that would happen, because the alternative was unthinkable. Perhaps he should think it stranger that such slender fingers belonged to the hand that had captivated _him_.

He glanced up. Potter stared over his shoulder, eyes shuttered. Severus coughed, and the eyes moved back to him.

"You will swear to go on visits of not more than a month in length to your friends," Severus said, "at the end of which you will come back to the Ashborn."

Potter nodded. "I so swear," he added then, but Severus thought the words had more to do with Granger's glare than his own.

Granger's wand butted against their joined hands, as blunt as the nose of a shark. The fire shot out of the end of the wand and coiled around their hands. Draco sucked in a little breath. Severus reached out with his free hand to touch his arm reassuringly. Draco caught his palm in a grip hard enough to hurt.

_He did not do that with the first set of Vows. _But Draco had been under a sort of sleeping spell in those days. It was not surprising that he should pay more attention to this one, to the words exchanged and the weight of the magic that bound Severus and Potter.

"You will swear to discuss the timing of your next visit with me, at length, so that we might agree on the nature of it," Severus said, and now his words were coming more gently and he found he did not need to avoid Potter's gaze. Draco's breathing had steadied as well. Repeating the Vows had done much to restore Severus's mood; listening to them might be doing the same thing for Draco, he decided.

"I so swear," Potter said, and the second tangle of fire appeared around their hands. Severus flexed his fingers open and shut to ease a cramp, and was surprised when Potter's fingers moved under his in turn. He looked at his face, but Potter had turned it away again. The only thing Severus could make out clearly was the flush creeping up under his ear.

Severus raised his eyebrows. Was Potter that intent on running away, then? Or perhaps he only wished to avoid looking at Draco. Severus darted a glance to the side and surprised Draco staring intently at Potter.

Severus muffled a snort and added the last Vow. "You will swear that, though able to move about freely, you will not attack me, Draco, or the Ashborn unless in self-defense."

"I so swear."

The last thread of fire gleamed there, and Granger moved back as though the Vows had dirtied her. Potter's hand stayed in place only as long as the flames glowed; then he snatched it back and shook it out. Perhaps he thought touching Severus had dirtied _him_ as well, Severus thought, his lips thinning, and took his time about turning over the parchment in front of him so that he could see the words on the back.

Granger tucked her wand away. "Well, that's that, then," she said, and relief rose off Weasley like smoke as he moved to her side. "Have your things all packed, Harry? Not that you could bring along much to this _dungeon_, not that Snape would allow you to." She stared at Severus as though she expected him to curl up and die at her accusation.

"Do you not wish to continue on as Bonder, Granger?" Severus asked, and made sure his voice was the perfectly calm, neutral tone he had used to deal with his mixed Hufflepuff and Ravenclaw classes back in his teaching days. "We have a second set of Vows to make."

"What—" Granger was most unattractive when she gaped. Weasley stood there blinking, as if he had known but believed Severus would never keep to his pledged word. Severus turned back to Potter, who at least had not risen from his seat, which must mean he had expected Severus to make the Vows, but who was staring at his hands.

"Potter," Severus said, and bit his lips when he heard the snarl in his voice. He had not meant to sound that way, truly. But he was tired of Potter acting as though nothing had passed between them, as if nothing had changed, as if he were still the nasty git of the dungeons from three years ago. Even if Potter chose to discount what Severus had told him and distrust him, he ought to know that Severus, as ruler of the Ashborn, was different from the Death Eater who had killed Albus.

Potter looked up. Severus did not know what he would see in those glittering green eyes until he met them.

* * *

_He's keeping them. Of course he is._

Snape had written two sets of Vows. He had showed them both to Harry. Harry had argued over the writing in both sets with him. It was ridiculous to behave as if that hadn't happened. His head felt hot, then cold. It was ridiculous to behave as if Snape would forsake the second set of Vows and let only _Harry _walk away with iron chains dangling around his neck that bound him to come back here in a month's time.

And yet, Harry had believed and behaved as if that was exactly what would happen.

His hand trembled a bit as he reached back out to grip Snape's. Snape raised one eyebrow and gave a faint nod, with less hostility in his face about it than Harry would have expected. Perhaps he understood that Harry hadn't meant to insult him or forget.

_Perhaps he _understood? _Do you know how unlikely that is? _

Well, still, Harry wouldn't give up this chance to maintain a cordial relationship with Snape. Not friendly, perhaps, because what lay between them was still too spiked for that name. Harry knew Draco had been gentler about the kiss between them this afternoon than Snape would have been, if Harry had gone to him with those ridiculous accusations and he had kissed Harry to shut him up.

Harry glanced up at Draco and met a pair of grey eyes that had some kind of heat between them. No, not _some _kind, really, a very specific kind. Harry had to swallow and turn his head away. Focus on the wording of the Vows. That would help.

Of course, they still needed someone to act as their Bonder if Snape was going to make his Vows to Harry in turn, and Hermione still had her wand in her pocket and an expression on her face that made Harry wince as if he was touching ice. It was—surely she wasn't that angry because Harry had failed to tell her and Ron about the second set of Vows, the ones Snape would make? Harry honestly had forgotten. They were too busy rejoicing and exclaiming over his release to leave much time for that, anyway. As soon as Hermione and Ron understood he could leave when he made his Vows, they had insisted on coming that day and seeing the Vows made as the sun set.

"Hermione?" he asked.

"You will serve as Bonder, Granger?" Snape had gone back to that neutral tone again, not as cold but as smooth as the ice in Hermione's expression.

"This," Hermione said, and Harry didn't recognize her voice. "No. Not for this set." She swallowed, and the click in her throat was the loudest sound Harry had ever heard. "No. Not when it ties you closer together."

"How can it tie us closer together than the Vows I had to make?" Harry asked, staring at her. He wondered if something else had happened before they came, something Hermione was anxious to get back and finish. It would make the most sense, if she was upset about that rather than something she had to see as good. She was big on equal bonds and debts and obligations—always had been since the fifth time or so they saved each other's lives when fighting Voldemort and Ron had started worrying about life-debts and Hermione had told them that they were all _equally _in each other's debt and didn't need to concern themselves with repayment.

Now, though, she stared at their joined hands, his and Snape's, as if she had seen a seed of Voldemort growing.

"I—fine," Harry said. He started to glance up at Ron, but although Ron was frowning at Hermione, he made no move to come nearer. Harry shook his head and wondered if he could persuade Snape to release the Ashborn woman he had promised to release early. Not that she would be in the mood to do something Snape asked her to, probably…

"I'll do it," Draco said, stepping forwards.

And of course he would. The instant he said the words, Harry felt something inside him relax in acceptance of the inevitability. It always would have happened like this. Of course it would.

Hermione glared at Draco, but raised no objection. In fact, she moved to the side as though she wanted to see better, and drew her wand again. At least she kept it low at her side, instead of ready in curse position. Harry had seen how deadly she could become during the war when she was rattled, and didn't want his first Vow-bound action to be to defend Snape and Draco against his friends.

Draco leaned his hawthorn wand against Harry's skin. Harry shuddered and resisted the impulse to move his fingers away. Where would they move, anyway, with Snape's clasping them like a rope?

"You will swear to release one Ashborn from your control, the woman called Incognita, and not to enslave her again no matter what her reaction is to her freedom," Harry said, not reading the Vow off the parchment. He was having as much trouble looking away from Snape and Draco as he had had looking _at _them earlier.

Snape nodded before he said, "I so swear." Draco's wand trembled a bit, or so it felt like, but Harry didn't know if he was imagining that or not. He had to look at their faces instead, at Snape's bent brow and cramped mouth, at Draco's face empty of everything except intensity, and even the tongue of fire that curled around their fingers was a secondary distraction.

"You will swear not to restrain me against my will during my visits with the Ashborn, not to call me back early unless you are in need of help, or to attack my friends because they might wish me to stay longer." Of course, Ron and Hermione wouldn't have much luck in getting Harry to stay longer, what with the Vow he'd made to return, but he could imagine Snape sending along a potion or poison that might hurt them anyway.

"I so swear."

Harry had to close his eyes for a moment. Both Snape and Draco were watching him, and their expressions were as near identical as made no difference.

_Oh, God. Two men who want me. Two Slytherins who want me, and that might be worse. And they're already lovers, and I have no idea what's going to happen with _that, _either. Wouldn't they just give up on me after a while and go back to each other? They know how to satisfy each other better than I would._

Harry shoved the emotion out of his head, hard, and sighed. Now wasn't the time to worry about things like that. They were supposed to be making a subtle and serious and binding set of Vows here, after all. "You will swear not to attack me during the times I'm here, not with Potions, not with magic, and not physically."

"I so swear," Snape said, and the third tongue of fire bloomed into existence. Harry glanced down at the shimmering mess, because it was better than looking at the different kind of mess in their expressions.

And then the fire vanished, and Hermione's hand was on his shoulder, tugging him backwards, and Harry was standing, and he nodded to both Snape and Draco—Malfoy, he would have to go back to calling him Malfoy when he was around his friends, and not thinking about that kiss—and turned around, floating Corners's cup after him along with his small trunk of possessions. He hadn't brought much with him to the Ashborn, but then, he had never owned much.

He had four new possessions to carry away with him now, though. The three Unbreakable Vows, and the mingled gazes heavy on his back.

* * *

Draco put his wand away. Then he turned and looked at Severus, who was still staring after Harry, his fingers resting lightly on the edge of the table.

Yes. The light he had sought and found in Severus's eyes years ago, when he had finally convinced Severus to become his lover, was there again. Focused on Harry, this time, but Draco didn't mind that, not when he was sure it was echoed in his own.

He flexed his hand open and shut. Feeling the fire run through him as he Bonded Severus and Harry was one of the most incredible experiences of his life.

But the fire in his mouth when he kissed Harry was another, and, well…he could hope to replace them both soon with something even more remarkable.

"Let's go home," he said quietly to Severus, and helped him to his feet, and guided him back inside the fortress, trying to ignore his own feeling that a light had gone out.


	24. At Home and Otherwise

Thank you again for all the reviews!

_Chapter Twenty-Four—At Home and Otherwise_

"We're so glad you're back, Harry."

Harry sat down at the breakfast table and took a large gulp of tea so that he wouldn't answer back the way he wanted to. Because it was true, and they were glad to have him back, and he knew it. It was just…everyone didn't have to keep saying _that_. They could say something else once in a while, and Harry was sure that it would be just as important and just as true.

Mrs. Weasley beamed mistily at him over a mug of the same tea. Ron sat next to her, eating his eggs and looking half-awake, still. Hermione made up for it with the large pile of books in front of her and the way she was plowing through them already, though Harry didn't know what she was looking for, yet. He had tried to ask her last night about why the second set of Vows, the ones Snape had made, had upset her so much, but she had avoided him and said she was going to bed early.

And then she _did_. It was unfair, particularly when Harry had to listen through the too-thin walls to the way she and Ron laughed together and then gasped together on his bed, and wonder who he would be sharing his bed with, in a month's time.

"Good morning, mum."

Harry shivered a little, and then lowered his mug and smiled at Ginny as she came around the table towards him. Ron's eyes opened wide, Hermione glanced up, and Mrs. Weasley was turning her head back and forth between Harry and Ginny as though she assumed they would fall automatically and romantically into each other's arms now that they were within range of each other. Harry bit his lip and said nothing, although he stood up to hug Ginny and receive her kiss on his cheek.

Mrs. Weasley sighed audibly when that happened. Even Ron muttered something that might have been, "What's wrong with the lips?" until Hermione kicked him under the table.

Ginny sat down beside Harry and reached for her own full and waiting plate. Then she glanced at Harry and asked softly, "How are you, really?"

And Harry wished he could answer that question with honesty, but he couldn't, not when they had six speculative and hopeful eyes watching them. (Well, maybe four, if you counted the way Hermione had turned back to her book, but Harry knew that she would start paying attention again the instant he said anything interesting). He settled for shaking his head and saying, "It'll take me some time to come to terms with everything, you know? I never knew—I didn't know how much the war had affected me until I went there."

Ginny's forkful of eggs paused halfway to her mouth, and she stared at him so long Harry thought she was going to vomit something at him. Then she said, "You—you _admitted _that? Your friends and the remnants of the Ministry and people looking up to you and those nightmares you had and we heard couldn't get you to admit that something was wrong with you after the war, but Malfoy and bloody _Snape _got you to admit it?"

"_Ginny_," Mrs. Weasley said, but Harry had no idea if that was for the sentiments she'd expressed or the language she'd used to express them. He couldn't move, couldn't look away from those brown eyes he'd imagined so often during the war and then seen so often afterwards with chaotic and weirdly mixed emotions.

"Well?" Ginny pushed back her plate, and then her chair, fixated on Harry to the point that he was starting to worry. Ron and Hermione would get involved in a few minutes, and then it _would _all be over but the shouting. "They managed to get you to admit something? They're trying to—they made you able to admit something?"

"Er," Harry said, because he wasn't sure what answer would provoke her temper. "Yes, I think so? But I knew I wasn't entirely healthy before I went there," he added, and couldn't help the sharp tone that crept into his voice. "I just didn't see much point in talking about it when I had all these decisions to make, and the aftermath of the war to deal with, and then the Ashborn to worry about."

Ginny nodded. Harry didn't see any tears in her eyes, but he also didn't know what to make of the set of her jaw and the way her hair bounced around her. "I _see_," she said, and then turned and strode out of the house in a way that made it clear she wasn't just taking a trip to the Quidditch pitch.

Harry stared around helplessly. Ron and Hermione stared back. Mrs. Weasley was the one who reached out and placed a hand on his shoulder, saying, "I'd go after her if I were you, dear." Then, because she _was _Mrs. Weasley, she added, "I'll keep your food warm."

"Er, thank you," Harry said, and scrambled after Ginny.

She did go to the part of the garden where they often played Quidditch, after all, and walked back and forth, her arms wrapped around herself, her red hair bright enough, Harry thought, to combat the chill morning. He waited for her to speak, but the loudest word that came out of her mouth confined itself to a mutter. Harry finally sighed and broke in. "Are you angry at me for healing, or finding healing with them?"

"I could never _help_ you!" Ginny shouted, spinning around. Her eyes were bright with a queer light that Harry thought was worse than tears, in a way, although he had always thought he would face anything rather than a girl in tears the way Cho had been. "I knew something was wrong, but you never bloody _admitted _it! You just nodded and smiled and talked about how you had decisions to make. You never take time for yourself, Harry James Potter, you push everything away until it festers and bursts out at once, and now there's no more V-Voldemort for you to take on and pummel until he explodes. Ron is right, you think about others too much, you sacrifice yourself for them too much—"

"Ginny," Harry broke in. He could feel something settle in him as he stood there, or something open. "I know you didn't really come to say that. So what did you come to say?"

Ginny bowed her head, and there was a bright flush on her cheeks, so bright that Harry winced again. "I wanted to be able to heal you," she whispered. "I wanted you to reach out to me. But you didn't, and you didn't, and then you went away, and Malfoy and Snape are the ones who started to heal you and make you admit things. You're going to give them the deepest parts of yourself."

"But not the best," Harry said, moving a step nearer and reaching out with one hand. "You think—you think I _want _people to know about my fucked-up childhood that way? Or goad me into admitting that sometimes I go too far in caring about people? I don't. They did it because they knew I didn't want that to happen, and they're Slytherins. They're enemies. They take delight in tormenting me."

_Not anymore, _said the part of himself that remembered the kiss he and Draco had shared.

Harry shivered, and then focused on Ginny. She had the most peculiar look on her face, but he honestly wasn't sure what he had said that caused it.

"Are you all right?" he tried, because sometimes that got a good response.

Ginny shook her head, but he didn't know if that was an answer to the question. "You don't want someone to make you think about that, but thinking about that is exactly what you need," she said. "I had the feeling that you were ignoring things that someday would crop up and bite you in the arse. If they're making you think about them, then they're doing you a service. And all your friends a service," she added, though there was a strangled note in the back of her voice that made it clear she hated to think about that. She backed a step away from him, then another. "And I don't want to date you anymore."

He had known about this, Harry reminded himself. This wasn't the great and shining romance that Ron and Hermione had. If he and Ginny were going to have that, he would have seen some sign of it between the end of the war and now. But it still hit him like a punch to the gut. He nodded. "Because I shared something like that with someone else?"

"Because you don't want to face it." Ginny had a slash of light in her eyes that Harry had never seen before, an odd glitter to her smile. "You didn't talk about it before, but I told myself you needed time to recover. To know that you never intended to discuss it with me…that's something different."

Harry swallowed and nodded again. He reckoned he could see why she would feel that way, though it still hung a new rock around his neck. "All right. Thanks—thanks for being honest, Ginny." And he would try to get used to the idea of a future where he would definitely not date her, where he wouldn't marry her, where he wouldn't go through a period of misunderstanding and then get back together with her again. When he was with Snape and Malfoy, he had already been thinking about that. He had acknowledged it and moved on.

_But it's harder to move on with her standing in front of you, and you knowing all the things that you've lost now that you don't have her anymore._

Ginny reached out and patted his shoulder, then withdrew her hand. "We'll both move on," she said. "I think we both did already. This is an acknowledgment of what was true?" Her voice rose into a question, and she winced, but she didn't move her hand from his shoulder. Harry gave her a tired smile and reached up to pat her wrist, realizing for the first time that she probably had had as much to endure as he had. He'd never written directly to her when he was with the Ashborn, even, he realized. Better to part from someone he couldn't bother to remember in his letters.

"I hope you find someone who deserves you, Ginny," he said quietly.

"I hope I find someone _I _deserve," Ginny said, and smiled at him, and went back in to breakfast. Harry remained outside to watch the sun coming up and let his mind roam freely. He would have to talk to Ron and Hermione about how he wouldn't be marrying Ginny soon enough, and he wanted a bit of free time before then.

For some reason, he caught himself wondering what Malfoy was doing right now.

* * *

"I'm not going to do this."

Severus laid his spoon beside the plate and leaned back in his chair, watching Draco with the kind of cool look that he would use on a student who had messed up a simple potion. Draco felt his shoulders hunch and his head start to bow. He would react like that to that look, of course he would, and the conversation would cease, and Severus would go to his brewing, and he would—

_I will not._

Harry had taught him this much: that he had a right to stand up for himself, that when Severus began to speak, as he had this morning, of spending too much time alone and apart, Draco had the right to ask for his attention back. He uncoiled the tension in his shoulders and met Severus's eyes with a cool look of his own, which made him blink.

"I won't let you hide from me," Draco said. "If you want to row with me, we can, but there's a difference between agreeing to that and letting you shut me out. That's not going to happen. Until Harry comes back, we will speak to each other like lovers."

"And when he comes back, then that will cease?" Severus's voice had the sound of dark waters running in a cave.

Draco let his lips curve in a vicious smile. "Why," he said, "I hear a certain tone in your voice. Let me analyze it. Could you possibly be _jealous_?"

Severus reached out with one stiff hand and picked up the small glass of juice that sat by his plate. He was always drinking it in the morning with his coffee, and Draco didn't actually know what was in it. Fruit, he thought, and milk, and possibly real juice, and he wouldn't be surprised if there was some sugar, to keep Severus going through the severe middle of the day when he had to be in the lab watching several potions at once. But what else it might be, he didn't know. Nor was he tempted, from the smell, to ask.

"I will not have you speak to me that way," Severus said, all offended dignity and chiming neurosis.

Draco smiled at him again. "What way? Treating you like an ordinary human being, the way that you've so often treated me?"

Severus lowered his head and looked like someone unexpectedly confronted with a stone wall where he had anticipated nothing harder to break through than mud. "You are inexplicable, Draco," he said. "I treat you well, and you throw it back in my face. I try to reconcile with you, and you hint that what you most look forward to is Potter returning."

Draco felt a tremor shake his legs, and then they relaxed and uncurled under the table. He wondered if this was something he had to thank Potter for, as well. If he argued with Severus, he had the chance to avoid a panic attack by remembering that Severus could not cut him off with that devastating, snowy silence. Draco could object, and he could make moves for reconciliation, and Severus could answer him, but he could not turn his back and walk away.

_We are in this together._

"I want him back because he makes us more lively," he answered, when he realized that Severus's stare at him had turned sharp. "And because of what his presence means for us. But that's not the same as wanting him back because he's not you." He reached out and laid a light hand on Severus's wrist, the kind of gesture Severus would never have permitted him to make a month ago. "Can you understand that?"

Severus spent a few moments breathing in and out. Then he inclined his head. "I can," he said, and his voice dug into Draco still, but not as much as it had before. "That does not mean that I cannot see him as—competition."

"I want him," Draco said. "You want him, too. Let's dream about him and talk about him together, and practice our sexual techniques for the next time he's here."

Severus choked on his tea. He put the cup down carefully next to the cup of his morning drink, and shook his head. "The first thing I must do, according to the Vows, is free Hilda Incognita," he said. "And that is not likely to be pleasant or fun."

"Sure it is," Draco said, meeting his gaze and not turning aside. If Severus wanted a lover he could intimidate into silence all the time, he should have looked elsewhere. "Think of the way that Harry will stare at you when he hears you actually did it."

"_That _will not be pleasant, either," Severus said, giving him a look that was two notches deeper down the oddness pole than "strange." "And he knows that I intend to free her. I made it as a Vow. I promised it as a gift to him. I have no choice."

"I don't think Harry takes promises like that into consideration, even Vows," Draco said thoughtfully, picking up the last slice of banana on his plate to finish it. "He doesn't trust people that way. Words are words, and actions are actions. There was no other reason for him to be so surprised that you intended to go through with your own replacement Vows. When he heard you say them, then he believed. Not before."

Severus paused for a moment, and then frowned and leaned back in his chair, staring at the air halfway between Draco's head and the ceiling. Draco relaxed. He knew that frown. It was the "this is an interesting new experiment" expression, not the "this is a moment of imminent danger" one.

"I had not conceived of it that way before," Severus said. "But you are right. Promises—even when I tried to give him those clothes and had them spread out in front of him, he made no move to take them. He did not trust me to keep the promise. But he accepted the Vows, because they were an action I took and he knew the magic bound me." He lowered his gaze to Draco's. "Did you make him promises he did not believe?"

Draco grimaced, but nodded. He was the one who had started this line of conversation, so he owed it to Severus to reveal the truth of it on his side. "I promised him that I would be his friend, and that I only wanted friendship in return. But then I acted pretty much the same way, and asked him to listen to me, and showed no interest in listening to him. He had no reason to believe me—not until I said I would leave him alone and then did it. He didn't expect that."

"What has made him this way?" Severus asked, as if talking to himself. "He trusted Albus's promises in school."

"All the time?" Draco cocked his head, and tried to remember the way Harry had acted when they were children in an unbiased way, one that didn't involve detentions and House rivalries. "Dumbledore promised he would be safe and could have a normal childhood. He made that promise to all of us, at the Feasts, and if he singled out Harry for another conversation later, I don't know it. But Harry wasn't safe, and he could never be normal. Perhaps he learned that his first year."

Severus said nothing. Draco looked back at him and saw that he had his forehead resting in one palm, his elbow braced on the table.

"I'm sorry," Draco murmured, suddenly remorseful. He knew better than anyone else alive how little Severus liked talking about the Headmaster and mentor and great man and horrible man he had murdered.

"No, it must be done," Severus said, and raised his head as though to answer a question Draco hadn't asked. "No, I believe you are right. Harry will trust actions." He shoved himself back from the table with a motion that made Draco jump; he had never used anything half so violent before. "And I have an action to do that I have been putting off long enough."

Draco knew what he was going to do, and he knew it had to be done, and he knew the Vows compelled it. None of that stopped him from swallowing nervously as he followed Severus down the corridor in the direction of the room that he knew Severus had already set aside for freeing Incognita.

_I hope the action is enough, that's all. And I hope that it doesn't destroy either Severus or Harry._

* * *

It wasn't the same.

Harry had been so sure it would be. Oh, granted, he hadn't had much time with Ron and Hermione after the war, before Snape's demand for hostages came down, but he had had time with them when they were children, before the—before the war. He had assumed that coming back from the Ashborn would be like returning from the Dursleys'. He had endured a month of imprisonment, he would have a month of freedom, and it was the things he did during the month of freedom (at Hogwarts, at the Burrow) that mattered.

But now he had to acknowledge that that wasn't it. The war could have changed them, or his willing submission to the Vows in the first place, or the breakup with Ginny. But he no longer knew his friends in the same way he had.

He wanted to ask Hermione about her reaction to Snape's Vows, but she avoided him for the first day they were back at the Burrow. So he asked Ron instead, as they lay on their backs in the long grass behind the Burrow, a Warming Charm wrapped securely around them.

Ron bit into an apple instead of replying. Harry watched him and compared his ripe munching with that of a centaur, and then shook his head. Bargain with the Ashborn or not, the centaurs had nothing to do with him anymore. _Nothing_. The alliance would have to belong to Draco and Snape, not to him.

A movement out of the corner of his eye caught his attention, and he turned to see Corners sliding out of the cup, all but one tendril that he kept connected to the bottom, and exploring the garden. His body looped and slid and shone among the grass blades, which trembled towards it as if expecting irrigation. Harry smiled. At least someone was enjoying the visit here without worry.

"She thought you'd leap at the chance to be free," Ron said suddenly.

Harry blinked and turned around. "Of course," he said. "I do. I will. But I couldn't really be completely free anyway, not with those Vows I had to make to Snape. Why did she get angry about the ones Snape wanted to make and not the ones I made? That's the real problem, if she's thinking I should have freedom."

Ron turned his head and spat a piece of apple that was evidently sour into the grass. His fingers flexed for a moment, as though he was clutching an invisible weapon, and then he relaxed and shook his head. "She's talking about the freedom _from _Snape and Malfoy," he said, voice so quiet that Harry could hear the slight rushing of the water in Corners's body better than he could hear it. "The freedom to be free. Not the freedom to be with us. But you went looking back at them, and Snape bound himself with chains to you, and that means you need to do something for him. Not for the sake of the peace between the Ashborn and our people."

Harry turned his head uneasily to the side. He hadn't told them about the kiss with Malfoy, of course, but based on the way Hermione stared at him with flat eyes sometimes before she turned away, he thought she might guess.

"I didn't ask to be a hostage," he chose to say. "And I appreciate what she did, trying so hard to publish articles with Snape's research so he would let me go in the first place. That was brave of her, and clever. No one else would have thought of that."

He'd thought surely that was the right thing to say, that Ron wouldn't disagree with him and would like to hear Hermione praised, but Ron stared at him. "She wasn't the one who did it," he said.

"Yes, she was," Harry said, and blinked. "Is that it? Does she think I don't give her enough credit? Snape never would have thought of bending the Vows if she didn't convince him that he could have some of his glory back—"

"But he did," Ron said quietly. "She didn't have any articles actually published, only one accepted for publication. She thought the process would take months and months. And you came along and did something that convinced Snape to let you go like that. Or else Snape changed his mind, but he doesn't hate you. We both saw that. Neither did Malfoy. They want you. They want to keep a hold on you."

Harry winced, and then sat up and stared at his hands. That was true enough, and he didn't think he could have lied to his best friends about it for long even if they didn't notice something odd at the Vows-swearing.

"Fine," he said, and forced the bitterness that wanted to grow there from his voice. "Then I'm what I was a few months ago. Not a hostage, but someone who serves as a symbol. I'll probably be better at that role than I was at actually judging and deciding things, anyway. I was a symbol of hope during the war."

Ron didn't say anything, which Harry thought might have meant that he'd convinced him. But in the end, he glanced up and found Ron's eyes fixed on him, his own arms wrapped around his chest as though Harry was a cold wind he had to shelter from.

"They don't want that," he said. "They don't want you a symbol of hope. They want you as a person, don't they? That was what I saw in their eyes, and that was what Hermione got upset about. If Snape just accepted your Vows and didn't make any of his own, then it might mean he would let you go. But if he accepted them and wanted to give you something in return, something to bind you closer to him—it might mean you would want to go back to them."

Harry felt the words welling up in him that he knew would cut their friendship if he spoke them aloud. He closed his eyes and shook his head, forcing himself to breathe shallowly instead of striking out the way he wanted to. No. He would wait. He concentrated on his breathing and nothing else until he thought he could speak.

That had one good effect, at least, he saw when he looked up. Ron watched him with his eyes slowly blinking, instead of backing away or turning aside.

"Listen," Harry said. "I'm not saying that I want them yet. I know I want to help people, like I told you the last time you visited the Ashborn. And I know that Malfoy kissed me, and it was amazing."

Ron's eyes closed as if in pain.

"And I know that Snape agreed to free one of the Ashborn from his control, and I want that," Harry went on. "Strongly enough that I was willing to swear the Vows to go back to them again—not that that was something I thought I could get out of. But I had more choices than I expected with them. More than I ever thought I would have."

"They're tricking you," Ron whispered. "You think they want you whole and happy and free? They want you under their control, surrendering to _them_."

"Everything argues against that," Harry said quietly, his wild heartbeat slowing. Perhaps the trick of concentrating on his breathing had worked after all. "Snape weakens the Ashborn by freeing one. He weakens himself by doing what _I _want. He can't keep control of all the people he had when I first went there as a hostage. Even if I only ever pressure him into freeing Incognita, still, that's a crack in his power. One he was willing to make for me."

Ron watched him from the corner of his eye, then said, "But that's my point. They're playing a long-range con. Give you something you want, and they can have a much larger slice of the pie later."

Harry laughed in spite of himself. "Am I a prime candidate for submission, Ron? For someone who's neat and comfortable to control, the way you're trying to picture me?"

Ron frowned, as if he didn't understand. "No. Not yet. But by giving you gifts, that's what Malfoy and Snape are trying to make you."

Harry shook his head. "And since when do I accept gifts, or bribes, easily?"

Ron had to smile. He was probably thinking of the times that he and Hermione had to force Harry to sleep, eat, take a shower, stop studying, or do something else other than work to defeat Voldemort during the war.

Harry wondered for a moment if he was going too far the other way now. _During the war, I did so much. Too much. Am I relaxing now because I can, and someone who appeals to my need to be lazy and selfish is going to appear to be right? _

But no, that couldn't be, because Ron was, again, the one who had told him that he could stop helping the Ashborn and Snape and Draco, that it didn't matter, and he could come home and forget about the problems of the world. Harry did think Snape and Draco were probably trying to get something for themselves, but then, so was he. He hadn't asked to see into Snape's mind out of some idea of benefiting _Snape._

"You've gone all red."

Harry started and came back to himself, issuing a silent reminder to his brain not to get caught up in his memories of Snape and Malfoy. No one else would understand what it meant when he flushed like that. "Sorry," he said. "But, Ron, I really think I can trust them. A _bit_," he added, when Ron frowned at him. "Not all the time. But…I can trust them to look out for their own best interests. I can trust them to keep the Vows, because they have no choice. I can trust them to want me to come back and to keep the peace, because not doing that would mean they lose me forever."

"But you can't trust them to let you go so you can marry Ginny," Ron said in a tone that had all the bitterness of salt on tomatoes.

Harry sighed. "_I_ don't want to do that, Ron. And she doesn't want to marry me, either, when I've told Snape and Malfoy more about my problems during the war than I ever did her."

Ron stared. Then he said, "It's like that, is it?" For the first time since the beginning of the conversation, his face seemed normal. "All right. Half the reason I was fighting this battle was for her."

"You don't have to worry about it," Harry said firmly. "I may not end up with Snape and Malfoy—" Ron gagged "—but it's not because I'm pining for her or she's pining for me."

"Half the reason," Ron repeated. "The other half was for you. I want to see you free and happy, settled with the person you're in love with."

"Or the people?" Harry asked, mostly for the fun of watching him flush again.

And he eventually gave a satisfactory answer even to that, so Harry let him go and turned away with a faint smile to contemplating the sky above him again. He wondered when the owl would come telling him that Snape had successfully freed Incognita.

Or perhaps not successfully, but that he had at least done it.

* * *

Severus leaned back and sipped the hot tea he had dumped one of his experimental healing potions in. The warm liquid sped through his limbs and made the throbbing in his head diminish noticeably.

He had done it. He had broken the link to one of the Ashborn and proven that someone with a mind enslaved by him could retrieve her thoughts, could assert her mental independence, and could continue to function apart from him despite the Mark she still bore on her arm.

And he had proven that he could give himself a ferocious headache doing so.

Severus rubbed his brow, grimacing, and wondered if the pain he felt was similar to what Potter had once felt when his scar connected him to the Dark Lord. He could not ease the headache by leaning back or forwards, so he leaned his chin in his palm, sipped, and listened to Draco explaining things to Incognita in the anteroom off the lab.

Now and then her voice surged up with an angry recrimination. Draco would reply with some new bit of history or information, and hers would sink again.

Severus sighed. One thing he had not counted on when he created these links to the Ashborn's minds was that it would suspend their time sense, perhaps because he had not cared enough to record the conditions of each and every individual's life in the links, or perhaps because his own awareness of the passing time had pleasantly dulled when he could spend every day brewing in his lab. Incognita still thought it was the days right after the end of the war, when the Dark Lord had been defeated and the Death Eaters spread out in constantly changing packs, slinking from safehouse to bolthole to cavern and debating what they should do.

Draco had volunteered to explain what had happened, why Severus had done it, and what Potter had been and was to them now. Severus had let him. He did not know what Incognita would choose to do. On the one hand, she could feel no love for him for taking the place of their late Master.

On the other hand, she was an intelligent woman, and had to know that her past and the Mark on her arm branded her unwelcome in a large part of the wizarding world. Should she choose to leave, she would have to go to the Continent at the very least, and perhaps further than that. Severus thought they might be able to arrange an accommodation.

He took another drink of tea, and then put the cup down. The voices in the anteroom were moving towards him now. He sat up and turned around, fixing the anxious lines of his face in a smooth mask.

Incognita stepped into the doorway and stared at him, vibrating with the tension. Severus folded his hands in front of him, on his lap, and maintained his innocent expression without trouble. She was the one who had no wand—he would give it to her eventually, but not in the beginning, as he was not mad—and the one who had the Mark on her arm. He would apologize to her, were it necessary, but he would not fear her.

"So that's the way it stands, is it?" she asked, and her voice was split down the middle, with ragged edges. "Our Lord is gone, and you're the only one who tried to preserve what he fought for?"

"An accurate assessment," Severus murmured, barely moving his lips. Draco hovered in the doorway behind Incognita, he saw, looking as if he wanted to interrupt. Severus flicked an eyelid at him, and Draco stepped back. Their silent communication had improved since Potter's departure, he thought for a moment—or perhaps it was only that Potter had taught them the value of paying attention to each other in the first place.

"And this is what we have," Incognita whispered, apparently to herself. She pushed her hair out of her face and paused, then closed her eyes. "This is _all _we have."

"Yes," Severus said. "Stay with me, and I will not control your mind again. You will have a harder life than you did as an oblivious servant, a less contented one. But you will not go to Azkaban, and the Aurors will not harass you. You may be able to raise a family. We have spoken of such things." Well, Draco had spoken of finding a pure-blood girl to have children with. It was the last thing Severus wanted. The learning about pride he would do from Potter was the only teacher-student relationship he ever hoped to find himself in, ever again.

Incognita stared at him. "You enslaved me."

"And you attacked me and would have killed me soon after the Dark Lord died," Severus responded. "I took you first, in self-defense."

Incognita could not hide the way she stood straighter. She was one of those Death Eaters who would be cheered to be regarded as dangerous, Severus knew—another reason that she might not want to go back to the outside world, where the Ministry would lock her away and then cease to fear her.

"I will have to think about this," she said. "Are you going to be freeing all the Ashborn?"

"Not Bellatrix Lestrange, and not Fenrir Greyback," Severus said. He had made his decision on this, and if Potter wanted to question him on it, he would have to take it up with Severus in person. "They are mad, and I went through too much effort to bring them back to sanity. Rather than have them crack the bonds and begin my work all over again, I will simply hold them."

Incognita nodded as if approving of that decision, and then asked Draco to escort her to her rooms. Draco raised his eyebrows at Severus, and Severus nodded back. He had won that particular wager. Draco had thought she would hide away in a corner of the fortress, resenting them. Severus was the one who had insisted that she would understand what had happened, give up on taking revenge for the past when Severus could enslave her again if he wanted to, and want to resume all normal life as soon as she could.

When they were gone, Severus drew down a stack of parchment, an inkwell, and a quill from a shelf. He paused, wondering for a moment how to begin, and then shook his head and went with what came naturally.

_Dear Harry..._


	25. Letters Across the Separation

Thank you again for all the reviews!

_Chapter Twenty-Five—Letters Across the Separation_

The owl landed in the middle of the table at dinner, of course, smashing into the plate of potatoes that Mrs. Weasley was trying to hand across to Harry and sending bits of food flying everywhere. Ron swore as he got a faceful, and then shut up with a suddenness that made Harry suspect either Hermione or his mum had glared at him. Ginny brushed them out of her hair. Arthur ducked, and as a result, Angelina had to start hunting for napkins.

The owl, being Snape's owl, didn't look around to see the destruction it had caused, instead holding out its leg insistently. Harry picked up the letter bound to it and picked up the last slice of beef lying uneaten on his plate, too, tossing it high. The owl snapped it out of the air and spread its wings, soaring up. Harry tracked it with his eyes, wondering why Snape didn't seem to want an answer, but then saw that the owl had simply retreated to the windowsill to eat its prize. He smiled a little and unsealed the letter.

"Must you read that at dinner, dear?" Mrs. Weasley had Vanished the flying potatoes, cast a Cleaning Charm on Angelina, quelled Ron with a glance, and now leaned over towards Harry with a plate of what looked like broccoli, giving him a measured glance. It was the one that suggested how much better it was for all adults to pay as much attention to dinner as if it was a play.

"Yes, I have to," Harry said, and stood up from the table, moving towards the stairs as he pried the seal up. Of course Snape had sealed it. The seal bore the dark, rising bird of the Ashborn, and Harry hated the way his fingers caressed it for a moment, but at least he could acknowledge that they did.

"Oh," Mrs. Weasley said behind him, and there was a momentary, uncertain pause before she returned to handing dinner around. Harry could feel more than one person glaring at his back, but he couldn't help that any more than he could keep his fingers from stroking the seal. He at least went outside, and made sure not to bang the door behind him, so he wouldn't disturb the meal.

"You don't want to eat?"

Harry looked up. Corners liked the Burrow's garden, and Harry had left his cup outside, confident nothing could harm him. Corners loomed now, wavering gently back and forth, his tongue darting out to point towards the kitchen window.

Harry shrugged. "I have a—a message from the ones we lived with at first," he said. Snakes didn't have much conception of letters, but the Water People understood messages, Corners had told him, singing them across the oceans and sometimes sending out drifting particles of the water that made their bodies up, to tell something especially important, urgent, or complicated.

"Strange to interrupt a meal for them," Corners said, and lowered himself until his chin rested on the edge of the cup.

"Maybe," Harry said, and cracked the seal. He felt as if he had been waiting for a glass of water—real water, not living water like Corners, part of his mind added—that had taken forever to cross the room to him. He touched his throat, which felt unexpectedly dry, and pulled the crackling letter out.

_Dear Harry, _it began, and Harry had to pause and close his eyes when he saw that. That Snape had chosen that name for him meant a lot, and although Corners hissed a confused bubble of a question at him, Harry had to lean against a tree before he could continue.

It shouldn't have affected him so strongly. Harry had to think that it wouldn't if he and Snape had had a better relationship before he went to the Ashborn, or if he had loved Ginny and been happily preparing for his wedding with her. But there was the weakness in his legs anyway, and that dryness in his throat and lips and hands and even his tongue that resembled what he had felt the first time he kissed Ginny.

_Dear Harry._

_ I have freed Hilda Incognita. I believe she will accept the situation and continue to stay with the Ashborn, as so far she has few other places to go._

Harry snorted in spite of himself. "You arranged it that way," he said, and some of the trembling in his knees stopped. "Did she think of that? Or are you reporting half her words faithfully, you old bastard?"

Corners flicked his tongue at Harry and laid his chin on the cup again, watching him so intently that Harry turned back to the letter to escape that gaze.

_She has few other choices than the Ashborn. She has my Mark, and she was a Death Eater, and there will be those in the Ministry who remember her and might rouse their power enough to punish her. But she will not be my mindless servant anymore, and that ought to make you happy._

Harry paused, tracing the letters with one finger. Well, yes, it did. He had wanted free will restored to the Ashborn, and this was the first step, the one he never could have managed himself, pants at Legilimency as he was.

But…

But it meant more to him, still, that Snape had not waited to do it. The Vow he swore had not insisted he do it within the first two days after Harry's departure. In fact, it seemed more likely that he would have waited, letting himself recover his mental balance from the strange conversations with Harry and his new Vows, as well as the truths that Harry had discovered when he ventured into his mind.

But he had gone ahead immediately. Harry glanced at his name at the top of the letter again, and shook his head. Had Snape done that for him? Or simply to fulfill the Vow? He'd had little choice about the last, after all.

And did it matter? Ron would probably say it did, but Harry was starting to think it didn't, not if he didn't want it to.

He returned to the letter.

_When you return for your visit in a month's time, we will speak more about this, and about the future that Incognita may expect among us._

_Severus._

Harry traced Snape's first name, too, before he thought about what he was doing. He thought the flush actually hurt his face, this time, when he snatched his hand back. He coughed, and looked around, but no one had followed him out here. Harry sank back against the nearest tree and contemplated the letter for a moment.

_Us_, Snape had said, as if he thought that Harry counted himself among the Ashborn, or ought to. Harry would have bristled at the suggestion a week ago. A month ago. A year ago.

But he waited for the bristling now, and it didn't come.

In fact, what came before anything else, even hunger because of his interrupted meal, was the desire to write back to Snape. He might not expect an owl so soon, but Harry could read—as if it shone like a light in the middle of those forceful letters, the long strokes of the f's and the dots of the i's, even the way he'd signed his name at the end—the longing to have one back.

_A week ago, I would have laughed at the thought of doing something because Snape wanted me to._

Harry shrugged and hitched one shoulder up so that he could shrug the thought from his head. So that had been him then, and this was him now. He could do it if he wanted to. No one would object. This was between him and the parchment, and his own thoughts, and Snape.

_And Draco. He'll want a letter, too. You might send him one that's different from the one you send to Snape telling him that you're pleased he freed Incognita already._

The more Harry thought about that, the better an idea it seemed. Draco was the one who had volunteered as Bonder when Hermione wouldn't. He was the one who had kissed Harry, who had explained the lust he and Snape seemed to feel when Snape would have stumbled on the words, and the one Harry had woken from a dream of last night. He had lain in the dark, the bed seeming to shake with the thunder of his blood, and stared at the ceiling, intensely glad that he no longer shared a room with Ron.

Recklessness shone in him like an ember, and Harry felt a smile burn its way across his face as he climbed to his feet.

Why shouldn't he do what made him happy, with no care for whether it always would? Right now, he wanted to write to Snape and Malfoy, and then go down and be with his friends. Hermione might warn him that he couldn't have both worlds. Ron might worry that Snape and Malfoy were only playing with him.

But Harry had learned to live in the now during the war, and he was determined that that experience would not make a waste of his life, that some things he had learned during it would come in useful.

* * *

_ He wrote back._

_ You knew he would._

Severus dismissed the thought that struck him and opened the letter. His hands did not tremble. He had waited until they would not, and risen from the table when he received Potter's owl. Incognita, the only other one in the dining hall at the moment who had free will, had looked up at him with raised eyebrows, but turned back to her food when Severus motioned her to do so. Draco was spending the evening in a tub of hot water, recruiting from muscles strained during a Potions explosion earlier.

That meant Severus could carry the letter to his rooms and enjoy it in peace.

_He will have nothing important to say to you. You know that. He will acknowledge what you said, and nothing else. Why should he wish to do anything else? He is with his friends, and free from the hostage situation that you enforced on him. In the world beyond the fortress's walls, he will find wider expanses, other people, other gifts worthy of taking in, other things to spend his time on._

But Severus knew that voice of old. It spoke with his father's words, nagging, despising, disputing. It spoke in his mother's high-pitched, weary whimper, near the end of life and hating what her choices had brought her to. It had some of Black's tones, and something of Potter's. James Potter's, that was, not the tones of his son. Potter had whined in his time, it was true, but not about choices that Severus made.

_Unless they directly concerned him._

Severus glanced down at the writing, and fount two sheets. He blinked. That—seemed an odd length to write in return for the bare news that Incognita was free. Severus knew he had included Potter's first name in his letter, and a few other notes, but that was not enough to produce this–feast—in return.

_Is it not, with someone with a temperament as generous as Potter's? He gave his freedom up, or thought he did, forever when he joined the Ashborn. He risked his life during the war. He fought the Dark Lord several times while he was at Hogwarts. He is not the typical boy you thought him. He is something greater, something more._

_ As he should be, _Severus added, to finish off the thoughts. _Or I would have to fault my own plebian taste in wanting him._

The letter began with his first name, and Severus lingered there for a moment before moving on. No one was here to see him, and he had wards on the lab now so that Incognita could not approach without his being aware of her. He was as well-protected as he could be when one of his former servants had her own mind back.

He could permit himself to enjoy this.

_Dear Severus,_

_ Thank you for freeing Incognita right away. I know you didn't have to, and so you must have chosen to. That's another gift, right there. If you want to know what you can give me that won't be a bribe like the clothes and will mean something to me, that's the answer._

_ I find being back here strangely odd. I thought I would fit right back in with my friends and continue to do the same things I did before the war. But we're not in Hogwarts anymore. They don't even know when they'll reopen Hogwarts, it was damaged so much, and there are so many people who went there dead or missing. And the Ministry is pulling itself back together, but it's its own priority. So there's no help for Hogwarts coming out of that group of people, either._

_ I don't really know what to do with the Ministry, to tell you the truth. I got an invitation from them the day after I came to the Burrow—_

(Severus was more pleased than he should be that Potter had chosen to call the Burrow by its name instead of "home.")

_And they wanted me to speak with the leaders and aid in the restoration of peace. I'm quoting the letter, now, because I wouldn't be able to put words together like that. I keep looking at it and thinking that they wouldn't ask my input, they wouldn't care, if I hadn't defeated You-Know-Who._

_I mean, that's kind of obvious in a way. Who would I be if I wasn't their precious Chosen One? Just someone ordinary, someone who wouldn't have made the sacrifices and taken the risks I have. They wouldn't have any reason to pay attention to me if things were completely different. So to resent them for reaching out to me when I'm the Boy-Who-Lived is _completely _ridiculous. Of course they'll do what they need to do to maintain their position in politics, and I never expected any better of the Ministry, anyway. I don't know why I stare at the letter and feel this sinking sensation in my chest._

_ Maybe some of it has to do with Hermione. She's still not happy about that second set of Vows you swore, the one that ties you to me. I think she was prepared to see me swear, because she thinks of me as self-sacrificing—too much for my own good, sometimes. But you aren't supposed to be self-sacrificing. You're just supposed to be some bastard of a Slytherin, someone who's going to wiggle out of everything he can whether it would benefit him or not, because you hate obligations more than anything else._

_ And I can't fault her. It wasn't long ago that I used to think like that._

_ You haven't really been kind to me, she could argue. I could argue. I was the one who was in the Ashborn and saw the way you treated me at first. But even if it was only because you want to learn how not to be a master or a servant from me, you treat me better now. _

_ That's not the way it works, right? The evil hostage-taker doesn't get taught better by the hostage, except in fairy tales and the kind of rubbish articles the _Daily Prophet _prints. And Hermione is sensible, and she knows the way the world works. She doesn't like the world working in a different way, which seems to be the case when you have something like this. And she knows you, too._

_ Or she thought she did. I thought I did. _

_ I don't understand all the reasons that things changed. I do know that I don't want to go back to being the perfect icon and hero the way I thought I would become after I left you. I don't fit absolutely perfectly with my friends anymore. I don't want to participate in the way that the Ministry runs the wizarding world. I want to help people, sure, but not that way. I want to make sure they have enough to eat, and ease people's pain, and help them get their free will back. Maybe I want to help the centaurs resist the Ministry when it tries to take things from them they don't want to give. But I'm so sick of politics._

(Severus muffled a snort into his hand. Potter's past and status would ensure that he was always a player in the game, whether or not he wanted to be. The sooner he could accept that and start using the fame for his advantage instead of being taken advantage of, the happier he would be).

_I've babbled to you too much, I think. Thanks for listening, and I look forward to your owl._

At the bottom was Potter's name, his first name only. Severus folded his fingers over it as though he could hear the anxious voice speaking in his head, see the troubled green eyes staring into his. A tap and a flourish of his finger on the parchment, and he might feel the sweaty, smooth skin.

It was—

It was enough, to have this letter. Enough return for what Severus had done in freeing Incognita, enough return for letting Potter into his mind, enough repayment of the debts that might lie between them from Hogwarts, if anything did.

Potter had defeated the Dark Lord, and Severus had once thought that would pay the debts, because with the Dark Lord gone, he would not have to spy as he did, and he could have a normal life. But his resentment towards Potter had lingered unchanged afterwards.

He understood now. Potter had defeated the Dark Lord for the world as a whole. But what he did now, he did for Severus alone.

* * *

Draco had to admit, the last thing he had expected to receive was an owl from Potter. It seemed that Severus was the one who wrote to him, and the one who had a better claim than Draco did to his time and attention.

_But you were the one who kissed him before he went away. Severus never has._

That was true, and it made Draco open the letter faster than he would have otherwise, curious instead of suspicious.

_Dear Draco,_

_Being back at the Burrow isn't like I thought it would be. And I know that you probably don't know what it used to be like for me, and you don't care, but I want to write to someone, and you're the only one I feel comfortable complaining about some of this stuff to._

Draco raised his eyebrows. "Well, Potter," he told the parchment, "I did try to tell you what the Weasels were like. Not my problem that you're only finding out how reliable my advice was now, years after the fact."

It occurred to him that prim and proper pure-bloods, of the sort that he'd warned Potter on the Hogwarts Express to choose as friends, probably didn't speak aloud to letters, either. He waited a moment for the blush to fade, and continued reading.

_I can't be with Ginny. I suspected it before I went back, based on some of the things that happened after the war, but I really didn't have very long between the time You-Know-Who died and the time that Snape made the claim._

Draco rolled his eyes. Now he was making Severus sound like some sort of predator.

Then Draco paused and thought about the way Severus's eyes had sometimes looked when he spoke of Potter. It had taken him years to classify the emotions, but if he could blame Potter for not following good advice in childhood, Draco could surely blame himself for failing to realize what those emotions were at the time.

_That's a good description of him, and of some of the things that he'd like to do to Potter. If Potter knows that already, then we might avoid some of the tiresome denial that he'd otherwise come up with when it's time for us to become lovers._

And when had that become the goal, anyway, instead of Potter's friendship? Draco sprawled back on his bed and stared at the ceiling, trying to think about that, but could only come up with the kiss, the moment after Potter had told Draco that he knew they both wanted him.

Draco smiled. The feeling that settled into his stomach now was like the one that he got after eating a full meal, complete with sweets and butter and rich cheeses and all the things he liked best and wasn't supposed to have often.

_This is coming. It's really going to happen._

He shook his head, with a faint grin, and went back to the letter.

_Ginny accused me of never opening up around her. She said I didn't discuss my childhood or what happened to me during the war with her despite the fact that I needed to. I tried to say that I hadn't opened up around you, either, and it's true that I let Snape into my mind under protest. But that still counts as an opening-up of sorts, doesn't it?_

"Yes, of course, Potter, you fool," Draco said, and shook his head. He wondered if Potter didn't see when he needed help, or saw it and put it aside, or had become so accustomed to looking out for others during the years of the war that he thought his own needs were unimportant. But Draco had only seen him reach for his wand once in a harmless situation, not witnessed the nightmares and tremors and breakdowns that his friends must have, and he knew it. If Potter's girlfriend had been patiently waiting for him to discuss it with her, telling herself he only needed time, and then seen him come back from his imprisonment with the enemy more relaxed than he had ever been with her…

Draco could almost find it within himself to feel sorry for a Weasley. Except for the part where he smugly awaited the moment Potter would return, so Draco could show him everything he _had _figured out.

_Please write to me. I look around, and I notice all the ways that I'm different from them, now. Ron and Hermione talk about going back to Hogwarts like it's absolutely going to happen, and even Ginny mentions it now and then. They talk about NEWTS and jobs and putting the world back on track, but they don't think of themselves as participants in that kind of thing. They've done their duty, and now it's done. I hate the Ministry, but I could never sit back and pretend to an ordinary kind of life. Not now. I think life among the Ashborn suited me better because at least there was no way I could ever pretend it was normal._

_ What about you?_

_Harry._

Draco spent a few moments tapping the letter against his lips before he took out the materials that would let him compose a reply, but only a few.

* * *

_Dear Harry,_

_ Of course you needed help from someone else and you don't feel at ease among them anymore, you idiot. Weasley and Granger were right there with you during the war, and they helped you a great deal, I'm sure. But they didn't carry the burden that you did, of making sure the Dark Lord died._

_ Severus and I had similar burdens. His spying and killing Dumbledore, my mission to kill Dumbledore and let Death Eaters into the school, and then thinking that I had to somehow keep my parents from dying, or make up for letting them die—as though it was something I ever had a choice in—and then both of us living with the aftermath. I won't say we suffered as much as you did, but we both had that conviction that we were in the center of something huge and important, that other people were relying on us for their lives, that you did._

Harry smiled, but shook his head. Of course Draco would need to say something comforting while at the same time also reaching out to touch old grudges.

But he hadn't done as much touching on them as he could have. Harry had to admit that. He leaned back in his chair and lowered his eyes to the rest of the letter, ignoring the shrieks coming from below. Bill and Fleur's daughter Dominique was over visiting, and from the sound of it, had three adults fully occupied. Harry didn't think she needed a fourth.

_And I think it's time I thanked you for that, the way Severus may have done by letting you look into his mind. Would you like to do the same thing with me? _

Harry blinked. That had honestly never occurred to him. Snape was the one he distrusted, not Draco. Draco wore his emotions too honestly on the surface of his mind, without bothering to disguise when he hated Harry or felt annoyed by him.

_Or when he felt lust for me. _

Harry licked his lips and took a moment to find his place in the letter again.

_But you don't really need to, because I can tell you what I feel from here._

_ I don't think you can go back to an ordinary life, but of course you'll need some way of going on, of being with people from day to day and doing things that let you survive. You can't save the world and defeat Dark Lords _all _the time. But I think I can come up with a list of things for you to do, if you're interested._

_ Concentrate on freeing the Ashborn, and persuading Severus to do so. He doesn't need to rule over people the way he's been doing. It'll be the ruin of him as a person. He was intended to be a Potions master, not any other kind of master, and I think he's finally realizing it. But if you don't keep after him, then it's possible he'll sink back into his sludge of inertia again, and for some reason my arguments aren't as convincing to him as yours are. _

Harry snorted and rolled his eyes. "Could that be because you never learned to persuade, just command?" he muttered. "You commanded me to be your friend, even, when I would have thought you'd learned better."

_And teach me to have what Severus calls the appropriate sort of pride, if you would. I still think of myself as a Malfoy before anything else, but that's sort of silly, isn't it, when I've spent the last few weeks negotiating with werewolves and centaurs and fighting your mind free of vampires and dreaming about you. A Malfoy would never do any of those things. Magical creatures were too far beneath my father, and he would have considered that someone with a Muggleborn mother deserved it if he had a mind full of vampires._

Harry blew out his breath, a little abashed. At least Draco knew that he wasn't always the nicest person around, then.

_And can you let us like you? Perhaps that isn't the right word for what I mean, but I don't think any other conveys it, either. I think you would mock me if I said that I was in love with you, and in truth, I don't think it's got that far yet. But if you would let us touch you, kiss you sometimes, teach you anything you wanted to know about sex, and talk to you and learn you and know you better, that would be—a gift. _

Harry cleared his throat and glanced around the room, despite the fact that he knew no one else was in here with him, and in fact that he'd locked the door of the twins' bedroom for a reason. Merlin. Just when he thought Draco and Snape hadn't really changed at all, then they would bring out something like this.

Of course, maybe it was easier in a letter. Maybe, when he went back, they would be as distant and aloof as ever. They had only been apart for five days now. It was easy to keep a dream alive that long, harder for a whole month. Harry, who had spent a whole month hunting for the hiding place of the diadem Horcrux and had nearly given up and pursued another clue when he was close to the goal, knew that very well.

They might convince themselves they wanted him, and then see the reality again and be disappointed with his messy hair, or the abrasive tone in his voice, or the way that his robes hung on him…

"And maybe I can stop that right now," Harry said aloud, leaning back and speaking to the ceiling. "Maybe I can stop thinking that other people will always find me ugly and stupid and let _go _for once."

He hadn't realized until he started pinning thoughts like that down how often he thought about himself with disdain. It was weird, and it was stupid, and it was time to remember that he had _killed bloody Voldemort _and had done all the duty he needed to to the world. Ron was right about how much Harry was sacrificing himself, at least. If he was going to help people, it should be because he had made a conscious, willing decision, not because he thought he was a horrible person if he didn't help.

There was only one more bit of the letter, and Harry skimmed it twice before he made himself read it, and end the letter. He did have one from Snape waiting, after all, even though it probably wouldn't be as nice.

_Could you let us do that?_

_ I await your reply._

_ Yours,_

_ Draco._

Harry licked his lips, and then carefully folded up the letter and put it back in its envelope. This wasn't exactly the kind of thing that he wanted to leave lying around for Ron and Hermione to find.

He still had the letter from Snape to read. Or should he call him Severus now, since Draco did and Harry had already started calling Draco by his first name?

Harry paused, then shook his head. He really couldn't, not right now. For him, Snape was the man who had made his life a living hell in school _and _let Harry look into his mind and freed Incognita as promised, but Severus wasn't anyone at all. Harry would have to learn to know him more slowly than that.

He opened the letter and shook his head when he felt a little catch in his throat. So the letter was only one piece of paper instead of the two that he had sent to Snape. So what? That didn't mean that Snape valued Harry less than Harry valued him. And Harry had rather rambled in his last letter, anyway. Snape could do as he had to and still write a shorter letter.

_Dear Harry,_

_ You know yourself better than I had thought you could. You will never be ordinary—and that is something you may have yet to acknowledge—but your desires are strongly and clearly expressed, and we will help you achieve them. _

Harry blinked. Okay, that was a better opener than he would have expected from someone who was going to scold him for a rambling letter that exposed too many of his personal concerns. Which meant Snape probably wasn't heading in that direction, after all. He began to grin despite himself, and leaned back in his chair.

_The Ministry most likely will not leave you alone, which means you must become more forceful in refusing them. Find criticisms you can make that they will not want to see aired in public, and you will become more trouble to court than you are worth. I would stop short of actually publishing them, however, unless the Ministry descends to harassing you and asking why you have not tried to control the wizarding world, or implies that something is wrong with you for refusing such control. The weapons that you have at your fingertips are double-edged._

Harry nodded. That was a good idea, and not one that would have necessarily occurred to him. It seemed to him that he could only help the Ministry and end up doing things he despised, or refuse and look like an idiot.

_Well, trust Snape to come up with blackmail._

Harry rolled his eyes a moment later. He hadn't reacted with horror to the idea. That meant he shared at least _some _of Snape's lack of moral scruples.

He read on.

_The Ministry might always think of you as the Chosen One, but you have those around you who will not. Your friends will come to accept and understand you better. If you wish to hear my speculation after looking into your mind, I believe the war changed you and set you flowing in a new direction. Your friends did not have time to watch you settle and adopt that new shape before you had the challenge of the Ashborn to confront. When they come to realize how much is due to the war instead of being with us, they may be more at ease with it._

_ And we will help you with whatever you may wish, Harry. Draco and I. I know that you may be more comfortable with him, more settled in friendship, while you and I have daggers between us and may always do so._

_ But if listening to you will help, I will do it. If talking with me face-to-face will help, we may do that by Floo before you return to the Ashborn. If you need someone to convince you that you are not only a weapon or a leftover of the man who killed the Dark Lord, but that you are more important than that and always have been, I will do that. If you need someone to look into your mind and help you drain the poison from your memories, then I will do that._

_ I am not yet willing to say all the reasons why. You are more than my hostage and more than the man who has promised to show me the road out of service and mastery, but you knew that already. I do not think we are friends. Circumstances prevent us from being something other than friends. I do not yet know the name for this, for all the immense history that lies between us and that must be conquered._

_ But we will conquer it, if we will ourselves to do so. That, I do not doubt._

_ Yours,_

_ Severus._

Harry put the letter down and sat in silence for a long time, feeling as though the light from an imagined sun warmed his skin.

It was…

There were no words for the possibilities spiraling through him, for the pleasant dreams, that he might be more than the leftover weapon, that the greatest days of Harry Potter might not be in the past.


	26. Settling

Thank you again for all the reviews!

_Chapter Twenty-Six—Settling_

"I just don't want to see you settle for something that's less than what you deserve."

Harry raised his eyebrows and leaned back in his chair, watching Hermione as she stood in front of the doorway to the kitchen. He'd been in the Burrow's drawing room, reading the _Prophet _after a conversation with Ginny that made both of them giggle, concerning the pathetic Quidditch team that Slytherin would probably field at Hogwarts now that Draco wasn't Seeker anymore. Harry hadn't heard Hermione come in, and hadn't expected to; after all, she had avoided him in a determined fashion since he came back to the Burrow.

"That sounds good," he said, and smiled at her. "But I'm afraid that I don't know what you mean, and that makes me cranky and hostile."

Hermione took a hesitant step towards him, and then stopped. Harry waited patiently, his hands folded on his knees. Hermione made another step forwards, then stopped and jammed her fists into her hips.

"I want you to have someone you can trust at your side and in your bed," she said. "Snape and Malfoy aren't it."

Harry nodded. He had been sure this was behind her behavior, and now he had confirmation, which made him less cranky and hostile than he had been. "All right. But what makes you think Snape and Malfoy are the wrong ones?"

"Because of what they were," Hermione said. "And are. No one sane rules a group of people without free will, or supports them in doing that. Harry—" She paused and brushed her hair forwards across her eyes, then flung herself into a chair and faced him. "You nearly died to prevent Voldemort from doing just that. Why are you so enamored of Snape for having his own pack of Death Eaters? Many of whom are the same people, even."

Harry nodded. "That's a fair question. Let me ask you one in return. Can you imagine Voldemort granting me permission to willingly enter his mind?"

Hermione blinked. "Not without it being a trap and set up to destroy you in some way."

Harry nodded again. "But Snape did that. He asked to go into my mind when a vampire had taken it over so that he could make sure no trace of her lurked there. And he didn't find any. That meant he had seen memories that I didn't want him to see, and I wanted some way of redressing the balance, of making sure he _wouldn't _do something with those memories that was fucked up and would fuck me up." Hermione frowned at his language, but didn't scold him. "I asked him to let me see into his mind. He did."

Hermione leaned forwards. "And what did you find?"

"I can't share all the details," Harry said. "Snape's too private a person for that. But I can tell you that I did see he'd admired me for a long time, and that he hadn't hated me for months, if not years. He accepted that I was the final solution to the Voldemort problem before I did, even, and certainly before Malfoy did. He didn't interrupt me during a private moment that he spied on when he really could have. It's his actions, Hermione. They matter. What he showed me mattered."

Hermione frowned. "He's a master Legilimens, Harry. How do you know that he didn't show you memories he'd made up, or ones he wanted you to see so you would do what he wanted in return?"

"Because there's no way that I could have got that far into his mind without his help," Harry answered. "He used his Legilimency, but he lent it to me, so that I could get through his barriers and understand what I saw. If he's good enough to do that, and let me poke around—and I'm sure I hurt him, at least a little—and also show me only made-up memories, then he's good enough that he could have taken over my mind without my noticing, and stifled my objections to the Ashborn. I don't think he is."

"Then you still have objections?" Hermione looked him over carefully.

Harry rolled his eyes and snorted. "Of _course _I do. I think what Snape did is more than a little sick. But I'm willing to give him a chance to correct it. He's begun, by freeing the woman he swore to free." He thought about mentioning something else that Snape had said in his letter, but didn't see why he should have to. Either Hermione would trust his perceptions based on what he thought he could safely tell her, or she wouldn't. Harry had to do what he _could _do.

"If he does," Hermione said, crossing her legs and leaning back in her seat, "then I think I'll actually trust him."

"Thanks so much," Harry said dryly. "And will you also forgive me for trusting in him?"

"If it has good results." Hermione shook her head when Harry glared at her, and held her hand out. "Harry, I'm sorry," she said, as he clasped it. "But you went from being with us every day, trusting us exclusively, to being with them, and now it sounds like you might have started trusting them just because they were there."

Harry sighed. "It's not like I had a choice about becoming the hostage to the Ashborn."

"But you did," Hermione said softly. "We could have fought another war. We were poised to do that if you didn't want to go."

Harry sat still for a moment. That was the kind of thing he had been trying to avoid, he wanted to shout. He didn't want to be the kind of leader that people would sacrifice everything for, up to and including their own peace and lives. He hated the idea that he could have started a war, and they would have followed him—

_Accept the power that you have, _said a voice in his head that Harry couldn't identify as either Malfoy's or Snape's or Hermione's, because it sounded like a combination of all of them. _You'll never be free of some chains on your power. You took on the duty of defeating Voldemort because you knew no one else could or would do it. Accept that, and use it, and that's the way you will protect them. Not by pretending that what you can do doesn't exist, or doesn't matter._

Harry took a deep breath, and nodded. "I know," he said. "But because of the nature of what I am—what kind of person I am, I mean, not the bloody Chosen One or whatever—I couldn't walk away like that, and let another war break out. Not when we were reeling from the one before that. Not when I had a chance of saving us."

Hermione looked at him steadily for a moment. Then she nodded. "If you can believe that, Harry, I can."

Harry smiled back at her, and she got up and hugged him. "Just make the right choice," she whispered into his ear. "Please."

Harry didn't bother whispering. No one had intruded on them, and he wasn't embarrassed about anyone overhearing the conversation. "Even if the right choice means going back to Snape and Malfoy, spending some time with them?"

Hermione grimaced and spent a moment grooming her hair back with one hand. Harry watched her, leaning back in his chair and trying not to feel impatient. These were momentous changes for more than just him.

"I understand," Hermione said at last. "I wish you had chosen something else, but I understand. If that's the right decision for you, then I can't change it." Harry held his breath for a moment, and then Hermione looked at him, and smiled despite herself, and added, "And I wouldn't want to try."

Harry stood up to kiss her cheek and hug her in thanks and recognition. Hermione patted his arm and then went upstairs. Harry flopped back in the chair and closed his eyes.

_I might take Snape up on that offer of the firecall._

* * *

"You have labored for a long time by yourself," Laughter said, his knees tucked under him as he watched Draco. "Someone else should have come with you, to help take up your duties or to seal the alliance that you think we are building with the centaurs."

Draco sighed and sat down where he'd started to rise to his feet. He'd thought they were done for the night and Laughter would let him go now, but when the werewolf wanted to discuss something, it got discussed. "I thought you understood," he said. "I've discussed this with the centaurs who are staying with me, and they've agreed to represent it back to the ones in the Forest. But it's not something we can settle like _that_. And there's still no sign that Potter is going to be interested in it."

"Then ask one of the centaurs to come with you when you dream," Laughter said. "They certainly know how to do it, or else they're much more ignorant than I thought."

Draco hesitated. He had never tried to explain the details of the delicate situation among the Ashborn, especially given Kleianthe and Thera, because he had thought that would make them look weak. Laughter respected different kinds of strength, like the kind Draco had that could make him laugh, but strength always, and only that.

It was clear, though, from the way Laughter stared at him with amber eyes and pressed closer, that he knew something was happening already. And if Draco had to, he knew he could dream himself away quickly, before Laughter could harm him. He would lose the alliance if he did that, but he stood a good chance of losing it through lack of honesty, it seemed to him now.

"All right," he said. "I don't think the centaurs would. They've been rude to me and rude about me ever since Potter left."

"Because he was the one who made the vow that he would protect them, and he was the one who broke his word?" Laughter said.

Draco nodded. "They still want to be part of the alliance. They'll still speak to me. But they would rather be speaking to Potter."

Laughter gave him a smile. Draco tensed before he recognized it for what it was, instead of a baring of teeth. That, of course, added another touch of amusement to Laughter's smile, and he shook his head. "Then show them what they're missing," he said. "Bring them word of a successful alliance, and tell them to come and meet me for themselves. I'm willing to meet with them."

"You'll give your word on that?" Draco asked warily. He knew the werewolves would keep a promise if they made it. They had to have _something _that other people could trust, when even in their pack there were some of them who had a reputation for bloodthirst and instability. But if a werewolf gave his word, he meant it.

Laughter paused, then nodded. "I never had an intention of doing otherwise," he added, when Draco waited. "Yes, I give you my word that I will not harm any centaurs who come with you, except in self-defense or defense of my pack."

Draco promptly nodded. He already intended to ask Thera and not Kleianthe to accompany him, since he thought Thera could control her temper better. "All right. Then I'll invite them with me in the next dream."

Laughter reached out towards him. Draco forced himself to sit still, not draw back, and his reward was Laughter's hand grasping his in a strong shake.

"You have been one of the more patient negotiators I've ever worked with, if not the most skilled," Laughter said. "And when you're trying to pull this many people together, from so many different backgrounds, not storming away and screaming just because you become frustrated with them is a skill in itself."

Draco managed not to duck his head and blush like a teenage Slytherin getting her first compliment at a Yule Ball. He kept his head _up_ and blushed. "Thank you," he murmured. He tried to find an appropriate title in his mind—it was hard to think of calling Laughter "sir" now, but he'd never heard any of the werewolves call him anything else—and settled for, "I appreciate it."

"Come back tomorrow night with any centaur who wants to maintain the alliance as opposed to munching on her own cud," Laughter told him, and stood up to walk into the high grass at the edge of the clearing.

Draco turned and let himself fade back into his body, shivering slightly as he went. Only Potter's or Severus's compliments would have made him feel more.

* * *

Severus watched from a window high above the walled garden given to the centaurs—though not so high that he couldn't get an excellent view as Draco chattered to the nearest of the centaurs, the female with a calm look in her eyes that sometimes reminded Severus of Potter's grandmother. She dipped her head down near Draco now and took an apple out of his hand. Then she nodded and moved away, her tail flowing behind her as she munched the apple.

Draco relaxed the way he did when he thought no one was watching him, throwing his head to the side and straightening his back, before he turned to make his way into the fortress.

"It's very quiet here."

Severus kept from hissing between his teeth, but he still had a faster heartbeat than normal when he turned around and confronted Incognita.

She didn't seem to have seen Draco or the centaurs—though she would have lacked the necessary history to make sense of their interaction even if she had, Severus thought—and instead brushed a hand back and forth on the sill of the window across the corridor, her brow furrowed. Severus said nothing, and simply watched her.

He should know her better than he did. He had subdued her mind, Marked her, and treated her as a servant along with all the rest of them. But though Potter might not believe it, the Ashborn had tended to blend into one entity in Severus's thoughts. There was no reason for him to distinguish them from each other, other than by the difficulty he had in keeping control of the formerly mad few, such as Greyback and Bellatrix.

Incognita's mind had not been very different from the others. Severus remembered her as one of the average Death Eaters, the ones in the middle of the ranks, with no ambition to climb higher and no desire to sink lower. She would viciously defend her place if forced to, but there had rarely been anyone who would force her to. The other Death Eaters lived in fear of the ones above them or in desire for Voldemort's favor. The ones like Incognita, whom Severus thought had joined the Death Eaters because she disliked Muggles and wanted the wizarding world and their world separate but did not hate them, were rare.

She had been a good choice for the first one to free, he thought, and for a moment did not remember it had been his own idea. There was too much about that he tended to attribute to Potter these days, whether or not he had been the first one to come up with it.

"What am I going to do now?"

Severus blinked. Incognita had turned back to him, and stood in a challenging pose, her hands braced behind her on the windowsill. Her head was tucked down, her chin against her chest, her eyes so bright that Severus thought for a moment she might weep. He winced. He did so _hope _not. That was the last thing he wanted to deal with.

"I don't know," he said. "Do you have—ambitions to brew? To play politics?"

Incognita spread her hands. "Who would I play them with, when you and Malfoy are in a position of authority over me and everyone else around me is enslaved?"

Severus paused a moment, his fingers tapping on the stone. He had avoided the little project that Draco and Potter—Harry—had started, but there was no reason that he should not explain it to Incognita, he decided. If Draco could not use her, or found her a nuisance, he would have no hesitations about sending her away.

"Magical creatures," he said. "Draco has found material in the ancient books about the ways that pure-bloods once lived, in covenants and alliances with them. He is determined to resurrect those ancient ways."

Incognita blinked. "Why? Why doesn't he want his parents' money and lands back instead?"

The question was a good one, Severus told himself, and he should not bristle. Of course Incognita did not have the knowledge that could come only from long observation of Draco and familiarity with his desires, to know why her question was offensive.

"Because he knows that the Ministry possesses the lands now, and he does not want to fight another war," Severus said. "Building this alliance is a means of fleeing from war, or at least holding it back. Besides, the money is long lost and scattered. But this alliance gives him a place to exist, and a project to work on."

Incognita pulled a strand of hair into her mouth and chewed on it. Severus looked away so that she would not see and judge the curling of his lip. Of course she would judge correctly, that he would not have allowed any of his Ashborn to fall into such a dirty habit while they served him, and he did not want to deal with the temper that might follow.

"I used to study Mermish," Incognita said at last. "It's not much, but it's the kind of contribution that I could make to the war. It shouldn't be too hard to pick it back up again."

"I know that Draco has said that negotiating with the merfolk, and their several kinds, is likely to prove difficult," Severus said.

"It always is," Incognita said, and her eyes were staring into another reality, another distance, far away from the blank corridor in front of them. Her fingers tapped thoughtfully next to the windowsill. "The merfolk always have so much that they want, and want to take from someone else rather than earning for themselves. I wonder if things have changed that much, since the time of the last alliance. I wonder—" And she turned and walked rapidly in the direction of the door that would take her out into the centaurs' garden.

Severus relaxed and turned in the opposite one. Draco was recovering from his time in Severus's shadow, he was sure, and Incognita might do the same thing.

He paused when he rounded the corner and found Draco waiting for him in front of the door to his lab. Draco glanced at him and then turned away. In the silence, Severus heard him swallow.

"What is it?" he asked quietly, because he thought he ought to.

"I need—I need someone else to tell this to," Draco said, and when he turned around again, his face was anguished and very young. "The things I'm doing in the Forest with the werewolves. _I _think they're important, and they _might _be, but I need someone to tell me that they're important, too."

Severus opened his mouth, shut it as he considered the words he would have spoken about werewolves and becoming involved with them if he left it open, and opened it again only to murmur, "Come with me."

The wards on the lab unlocked when he touched the door. Draco threw himself into the chair nearest the door, one that Severus had conjured for Potter one day and then forgot to dismiss. He leaned his elbows on his knees and buried his forehead in his hands, breathing as though he had run a race.

Severus took the other chair and waited. The air between them was new, and thick, and it seethed. He and Draco had had few truly personal conversations since Potter went away, Severus thought. They understood each other better than they ever had, but they had needed Potter as a link in the chain between them. Without him, the chain fell to the ground.

But if Draco was willing to reach out and bridge the gap of air, then in good conscience Severus could do no less than the same thing.

"I've negotiated with the werewolves on my own ever since before Potter went away," Draco said into his hands. "And I don't know what to _do_, anymore. Laughter, the werewolf leader, has promised me help for help, but now he wants me to bring one of the centaurs along. And he's upset that Potter won't be part of the alliance. He doesn't say anything about that part, but I know the truth." He flung himself back in the chair and stared at Severus. "What should I do?" he asked.

"Why do you think that Potter won't be part of the alliance?" Severus asked, without asking about Incognita. If Draco had come straight to the lab after his conversation with the centaurs, he wouldn't have met her.

"Because of what he said before he went away." Draco sighed, a shimmering sound that seemed to gleam in the air between them, with weight and body. "That he was sick of politics, and he didn't want to participate in an alliance that would just bring him more people to help, more magical creatures he needed to sacrifice for, without offering him anything in return."

"He might come back changed," Severus said quietly. "Or you might be able to give him something from the alliance."

It was comical to watch the way Draco's jaw sagged and the young look took over his face. "_Me_? I was the one who proposed it to him in the first place, and he agreed because he was bored, but he was also the one who told me that I was using him too much for complaining instead of friendship, and that he didn't want to talk to me anymore."

"He let you be his Bonder," Severus said, and had to bite his lip, to hold back laughter. It was the first time he had done so in years without the laughter being part of a sneer or satire, and he experienced a brief moment, a thrill, of something like clear water running through his soul. "And you were the one who told me that he needed to trust actions. Give him a gift, and he has an action to trust from you."

Draco touched his forehead and then his jaw with his fingers, as though thinking. Then he smiled. "Thanks, Severus," he said. "I have an idea, even if it is based on an idea that I stole from you." He rose and leaned over to kiss Severus, his lips glancing off his for a moment as though unsure of his welcome.

But Severus reached up and cradled the back of his skull, bringing him close so that Draco sighed into his mouth and shivered, and then leaning back in the chair and waiting to see what Draco would do. He was hard, and he knew from the small, shifting motions of Draco's legs that he was, too, and he wondered if Draco would be brave enough to take advantage of it.

In the end, it seemed, no. Draco fled, and Severus leaned back and dropped a hand between his legs, reaching for his cock, imagining that Draco and Harry were kneeling in front of him, their eyes bright and their hands reaching out to touch him, in the moment before Draco leaned in and bit the side of Harry's neck, making his eyes flutter shut, ecstatically, as Severus had sometimes imagined on the darkest and loneliest nights of his spying—

His orgasm was immediate, intense, and more satisfying than any he'd had in months.

* * *

Draco hesitated before he cast the spell. He knew what he wanted to do, and thanks to the books in the library, he knew the incantation; it was the result he was unsure of. He wasn't good at sculpting automatons, not like Severus. If he had taken the risk and it turned out ugly, then there was no way he would give this gift to Harry.

The cat purred behind him, a throbbing sound that seemed to thrill up and down the scale and ask him a wordless question.

Draco smiled at the cat over his shoulder and nodded. "You're right," he said softly. "There's no reason to assume that I'll do it wrongly, is there?" The cat tapped a paw on the floor and turned its head, and Draco laughed. "Harry probably wouldn't want a gift that looked like you, anyway," he muttered, and then wove his wand in front of him, up and down and to the side with an abrupt motion as if he was trying to shake his fingers off his hand, while he whispered the incantation.

The air in front of him shuddered and turned silver, and Draco worried for a moment that looking at the cat might have influenced his thoughts too much after all. But the air shivered and rolled together then, and left Draco staring at a small, gleaming shape. When he reached out and pressed a finger against it, it was like touching cold air—less than solid, but real.

The small silver dragon opened its blank green eyes and stared at him. Draco smiled. He had wanted to echo Harry's eye color, and he had managed to do it.

He began to murmur the second incantation, the one that included Harry's name and some of the words he had heard him say, to bind his soul to the dragon. The dragon was a gift, but Draco had to make sure that it _became _one; just conjuring it wouldn't do anything except create something for Draco to use.

Draco wanted to make sure that Harry had one companion at his side who would be always loyal, and wouldn't question him, like his friends tended to do, or frustrate him, like Draco and Severus often did.

Harry might not understand without an explanation, but Draco would send a note with the dragon, and see what his reaction was. He hoped it would be favorable. Harry _deserved _all the gifts that someone could shower him with.

_It's just unfortunate that his principles restrict the choice of those gifts so much._

* * *

"Um. Hullo."

Harry wondered for a moment if he had made a mistake. Snape was turning to face the fire, but he had an abstracted expression on his face, his eyes gleaming like coins. He had been brewing, Harry thought, and part of him still was even though he was in his rooms and not his lab. Harry tried not to look around too much. He wouldn't want Snape to think he had called him here mainly to indulge his curiosity.

Then Snape focused on him completely, and a faint, bemused smile crept across his face. "Harry. There was something you wanted to talk to me about?"

"Just—letters, and things," Harry said, and tried to ignore the cramping twist in his stomach that said he should just close the Floo connection now and go away. He had endured worse from Snape, especially when it came to detentions in Hogwarts. "Um. I mean—I wanted to talk to you about Ministry politics." He waved the second letter that had come today, in a red envelope, as though whoever sent them was edging towards using Howlers. "Some way to get out of them, like you suggested?"

Snape smiled, and it was a smile that chilled Harry and made him shiver with something like delight at the same time, because at least he knew that smile was on his side. "Have you not opened the letter?" Snape murmured. "I can't help you without knowing what they want."

Harry nodded and opened the envelope. Hermione and Ron had thought he should look at it before this, but Harry hadn't wanted to, as though keeping it shut meant the Ministry's request would simply go away. But Snape hadn't scolded him about it as he expected.

_I don't think a lot of what I think I know is real, after all._

The letter tumbled out, a sheet of parchment so thin that Harry could see Snape's face through it when he held it up. "It says it's from Yolanda Trumpery," he murmured, and then saw Snape's expression change and added, "She's a sort of—Master of Ceremonies for the Minister, I reckon you could say."

"Yes," Snape said, but Harry wasn't sure if he had heard the name before or merely recognized the title of the office. "And she says that you're welcome to attend one of the balls or functions that the Ministry is giving to celebrate the ending of the war, yes?"

Harry scanned the letter, stared, and then scanned it again, understanding the words but not able to grasp that someone would actually write them. "No," he said slowly. "She does invite me to a ball, but it's a—a bit of an order to attend, and she says it's to celebrate escaping the Ashborn."

Snape shifted from one side to the other of whatever it was he sat on, but only said, "I see. Are they not aware of the real circumstances of your 'escape', then?"

"They must not be," Harry said, still staring. "But that doesn't make a fucking bloody bit of sense." He waited for Snape to tell him to mind his language, but he didn't, so Harry wouldn't. "They must know the original terms of the hostage exchange. How can they think that they're safe from you if I escaped?"

Snape leaned back in his chair and crossed his legs one over the other. Harry blinked. It made Snape look as if he was settling in for a long meeting, and Harry couldn't help wondering if he sat like that in the staff meetings at Hogwarts, too. "I would suppose," he said, "that they know enough to think themselves safe, but not enough to realize the terms of the Unbreakable Vows. If one of the Weasleys said something but did not include all the details…"

Harry opened his mouth to deny that the Weasleys would betray him like that, and then grimaced and fell silent. It wasn't betrayal to talk about something so public. Hell, if the Ministry _did_ have spies watching the Ashborn, they could easily see things like the exchange of Vows, which had been outside.

_Or the arrival of the centaurs. _

Harry put that particular thought away to worry about later, when he might be able to do something about it. "All right, fine," he said. "But that doesn't really explain why they command me to attend this particular ball."

"It celebrates a particular occasion," Snape said, his voice low and full of amusement in a way that Harry had never thought about it being. Or, at least, he hadn't thought about it being that way until very recently. "How can they do that when the guest of honor, the reason for the occasion, the only reason they thought of something like this in the first place, isn't there?"

Harry frowned and tapped his fingers against the heel of his palm. Yes, when Snape put it like that, Harry could see what he meant. And felt a bit stupid for not seeing it himself.

But he wasn't going to let emotions like that control his interactions with Snape, so he put them away, too, and said, "Well. Do you think I ought to attend this one, just to show them that I won't come to any more? Or do something else?"

Meditatively, Snape shook his head. His eyes had gone almost soft, and Harry wondered if this was what he looked like during Dumbledore's planning sessions._ And I need to stop thinking of the past and see Snape the way he is, now, in the present. _"If you go now, they won't listen to the implied message, or even the stated one. They'll only see you there, and see how many admiring glances they receive for stringing you along, and become more determined to demand that you attend the next one."

Harry sighed. "So the only thing I can do is prove myself more powerful than they are, because brute force is the only language the Ministry understands."

"Oh, I think some of them might understand blackmail quite well," Snape said softly, and his smile lit his whole face. Not in a way that anyone else might think particularly handsome, Harry decided, but it made Harry catch _his_ breath. "If you reveal, for example, what the Ministry's owl to you said immediately before you decided to swear the first set of Vows…"

"How did you know about that?" Harry exclaimed.

The glance Snape threw him had a little of its old scorn, though when he heard the answer, Harry thought Snape might be able to justify it. "I intercepted owls flying from the Ministry to you. In this case, I thought it worthwhile to let the owl go on after I copied its message, since it was what I wanted, after all: a promise that you would become my hostage and not lead another war against me."

"I couldn't have done much about anyone who wasn't Voldemort," Harry muttered, and rubbed his head.

"I have told you not to doubt your own abilities in this way," Snape said sharply. "And that is even more urgent if you have begun to believe that Draco and I want you. It would make us seem to be victims of bad taste, if we had a lover who was continually putting himself down."

Harry blinked, and then grinned. He could take Snape being a bastard, he thought sometimes, as long as he was using that bastardy in service of their common goals. "I believe it," he said quietly, and his eyes lingered on Snape's face in spite of himself.

Snape opened his mouth as though to say something specific and devastating in a new way, but then caught his breath and went on. "So. The Ministry demanded that you surrender yourself."

Harry shrugged. "I didn't think too much about it. There were too many letters arriving from all over, asking me to please surrender and stop another war. Ron and Hermione and the Weasleys were the only ones who really spoke against it and asked me to consider another alternative than sacrifice."

"As you should have," Snape said, but there wasn't much snarl in his voice. In fact, he cleared his throat a moment later, as though dismissing disturbing thoughts, and focused on Harry. "But this letter included threats. It would make for an…interesting document if released to the Ministry's critics."

"But I don't have the letter anymore," Harry began.

"But I have my exact copy that I made from the intercepted owl." Snape sounded as if he was purring. He folded his hands beneath his chin and met Harry's gaze, his expression so bright that Harry wondered how his eyes could stay so dark. "Shall I send it to you?"

Harry swallowed yet again. He was thinking about blackmailing the Ministry, and he knew he should be recoiling in horror. Hermione probably would when she heard about it. She thought the Ministry was horrible in some ways, unproductive in others, but it was still the best hope for keeping peace in their post-war world. And she was planning on reforming it from the inside, not destroying it.

Harry—Harry knew he had dreamed of being an Auror, but he couldn't do that, and he couldn't go back. He nodded. "Send me the letter," he said, his voice thick, as if he were dreaming and breathing underwater. "Then I'll decide how to make those bastards in the Minister's office who keep urging me to do things _their _way to pay."

Snape laughed in a way that prickled up and down Harry's skin and made the hair on the nape of his neck stand on end. "I look forward to it," he breathed, and the Floo swished shut.

Harry leaned back on the couch and draped his arm over his eyes, thinking about all the trouble that this was probably going to cause, with both the Ministry and his friends.

After a moment, he started to smile, helplessly, and didn't stop until Ron and Hermione came home from fetching their OWL results from the Ministry archives, necessary for people who were going back to Hogwarts this autumn. Harry watched them and listened to them talk from a distance.

_My life won't be ordinary, whatever happens. I might as well take control of it and make it the kind of extraordinary that I actually want to happen._


	27. Blackmail and Silver Dragons

Thank you again for all the reviews!

_Chapter Twenty-Seven-Blackmail and Silver Dragons_

Draco slumped back against the wall and closed his eyes, drawing in so much air that he made a disgusting whistling sound. He grimaced and forced himself to count to twenty before he breathed again. Yes, then he sucked in a bunch of air again and still made a disgusting sound, but it was briefer than before.

Something cool brushed against the back of his knees. Draco started before he remembered the cat. He reached down and scratched its back. The cat arched against his fingers, purring, and then glared at the dragon floating in the air before him, surrounded by a thin shell of blue light. The dragon, about half the size of the cat, scraped its claws rhythmically against the light, trying to get out and attack Draco.

Or, more likely, Draco knew, given the spells he had wound so carefully into the beast, to find the master of its soul. Its eyes resembled Harry's, and had grown brighter and greener as Draco cast the spells. Its tail shimmered with spikes, and each spike was tipped with a memory of a time Draco had seen Harry in battle, to make them sharper. Its claws bore the curves that Harry's hands did when he was clenching his fingers to keep from hitting someone. It turned its flexible neck, and its mouth had the same smile, or, in this case, the same angry frown.

"In just a moment," Draco assured the dragon, and then turned to face the cat. "Make sure no one is in the corridor."

The animal brushed its tail against his fingers, and then turned and flowed out of the room. Draco took a few more minutes to recover his breath and watch the dragon. It had settled down within the shell, curled up like an unhatched bird, but the minute Draco moved, it lifted its head and fixed him with those bright eyes again.

"We have to prepare him for you first, or he's likely to try and destroy you when you show up," Draco told the dragon. It seemed to understand him, although technically the only human voice it should know was Harry's. Or perhaps it liked his tone. It settled back on its haunches and flicked its tail around itself again.

Draco tossed a handful of Floo powder into his fire and said clearly, "The Burrow." He would probably get someone else, given the number of people in the bloody house, but at least someone would probably fetch Harry for him. _They _certainly wouldn't want to talk to Draco long.

The She-Weasel's face appeared after the Floo had flickered for a minute or more in green and blue. Draco couldn't help but smirk at her mussed hair and pulled-aside shirt.

Then he remembered who the most likely candidate was to make things like that happen, and felt his gut freeze and boil at once. _If Harry is touching her, then it's all the better the dragon is going to him. It can't leave him alone at all for the first few days if it's to learn his commands and routine._ Draco found himself giving a slow smile. _Isn't that just too bad._

"Malfoy?" Weasley sounded blank, as though he was the last person she would have expected to be calling. That made Draco wonder how much Harry had told his adopted family about his new relationships with Draco and Severus. Draco drew himself up and nodded, then gestured so that the dragon floated up beside him, although not close enough to be visible to the She-Weasel. He thought Harry should be the first one to see his gift, as well as the first one outside Draco to be acquainted with it.

"Yes. Will you fetch Harry, please? I have an early birthday gift for him, and I want to warn him it's coming."

Weasley folded her arms, and then seemed to notice how that made her shirt fall down and took a moment to attend to that. Draco didn't clear his throat and didn't let his lips twitch in a smirk, but Weasley flushed as if he had before she turned to face the fire again. "I don't know if I should do that. The sort of gift you have to warn someone you're sending is likely to be dangerous."

"Or fragile," Draco said. In fact, the dragon fit more into the category she'd mentioned than the one he did, but it would only be dangerous if Harry commanded it to be, or if someone attacked him. "Look, Weasley, you don't want to talk to me any more than I want to talk to you. Will you get Harry? Please," he added, when she showed no signs of moving.

"I don't know if I trust you to be good for him," Weasley whispered. "Some of the things he's told me are good, like the way that you had him talk about his past and relax, and some of the others don't make sense. Why did he find something in you that he couldn't find in me?"

Draco wanted to say, _ached _to say, that she had never been as good for Harry as she thought she was, but he swallowed back the words and produced a smile to cover the way he ground his teeth. "I don't know," he said. "Why did I find something in Severus that I couldn't in anyone else? Why is Harry attracted to both of us, and how can we find a way to include him with both of us, instead of just one?"

"That was more than I really needed to know," Weasley said flatly, her face turning green.

Draco shrugged and leaned a shoulder on the mantle, making sure that he was still blocking the sight of the blue shell surrounding the dragon. "You asked."

Weasley sighed and made a face. "Yeah, I did." She eyed Draco for a moment, then said, "All right. I'll go get him. But that doesn't mean he'll agree to you coming over or whatever it is that you want to do."

Draco also ached to correct her grammar and uncouth language, but he contented himself with a nod. From the way Weasley scowled before her face vanished from the fire, it annoyed her more than rudeness would have anyway, because it didn't give her anything to retaliate against.

Left alone, Draco had time to lick his lips and ponder the dragon, still sitting up within the shell and staring over his shoulder, or trying to, towards the fire. It knew the fire was a gateway to its master. Draco wondered, now, if it was true that Harry would like a dragon. Perhaps he wouldn't want a pet that would never leave him alone and would protect him when it saw him in danger, or wouldn't want one at all. Perhaps Draco should have asked...

But it was done now, the dragon was made, and Draco would have to send it on its way and believe that Harry would accept the gift in the spirit it was given. He was generous enough, after all, to probably do that no matter how he felt.

Harry's face appeared in the fireplace, and the dragon went mad, scratching and scrambling around in its shell. The spells Draco had used muffled the sound, at least. Beyond casting a slightly puzzled look in its direction, Harry focused on Draco. "Hullo, Draco. Ginny said you had a birthday gift for me?"

His face had a slight flush that restored Draco's confidence. He smiled, and Harry smiled back. "Yes," he said. "You know that Severus made an automaton for me that follows me around and obeys my commands?"

Harry held up a hand. "I don't know that I'd want an automaton like the ones that he has. No offense, but-"

Draco laughed, and this was easier than he had thought it would be, at least once he let go of the conviction that he would fall flat on his face because Harry had never asked for a gift like this. "Nothing like that! This one isn't really made of metal, even. I called it into being with a spell. It's real, you can touch it, but it's bound to you, and only you, and it wouldn't obey me or Severus unless you told it to."

"_You _made it?"

Draco prepared to bristle against the implication that he couldn't do complex magic, but in the end, he didn't think Harry was implying that. Harry was staring at him with an expression of revelation instead, and he reached out one hand before he seemed to remember that they couldn't touch unless one of them came through the Floo. He pulled it back and said, "Yes. I want it. What is it?"

Draco smiled. "It can't travel by Floo. The magic might undo the spells I used to make it. It'll have to fly to you." He knew he didn't imagine the way Harry's eyes brightened, which meant that Draco had been right and yes, he did like the idea of a pet that flew. "Can you make sure that you're outside or in a room where no one else is? It'll probably go right through any obstacles in its way."

Harry nodded, looking entranced. "What is it?"

Draco smiled more broadly. "A dragon."

Harry grinned. "And probably _not _just because that's what your name means, right?"

Draco flushed. He hadn't considered that Harry might interpret his gift that way and think of Draco as conceited because he had wanted to give Harry a dragon. He started to open his mouth, but Harry, his smile changed, held up a hand and shook his head. "No need. I can see it wasn't." He paused, his lips moving as if reading a book page to himself, then nodded. "And you're quite-handsome when you're flustered and earnest."

Draco could play _this _game. He leaned forwards in response and murmured, "I see that you've been thinking quite a bit about that kiss since we shared it, Harry."

That made Harry splutter in turn and open his mouth to try denial, but Draco stepped back and flicked a languid finger. "Never mind, Harry. I'm sending your gift now. As I said, try to make sure that you're outside or in a room with open windows and no one else."

"I'm going outside right now," Harry said, his voice breathless. Draco hoped he could discern a slight stiffness in the way he walked as Harry pulled back from the fireplace, but that was probably wishful thinking.

It wasn't wishful thinking, though, that Harry popped his head back into the flames before he closed the connection and said, "Thank you, Draco. Really." His eyes had a deep color to them that Draco knew didn't come just from the Floo.

Draco managed a nod, and then Harry jerked back and the connection closed. He thought he could hear the brief thumps of eager footsteps before it did.

Draco turned back to the shell of blue light and found the dragon waiting for him, back humped up as if he was a scorpion. Draco snorted as he reached up and stroked his wand along the edge of the shell. "Of course, you'll get all bristly like that because I won't let you go, but you wouldn't have existed without me, remember that."

There was no sign that the dragon _did _remember it, but then, it had had a glimpse of its master now, and Draco knew it wouldn't stay for any reason. The shell broke, and Draco ducked as the dragon swirled over him, its wings causing a downbeat of diamond-like light before it was gone, through the open door and down the corridor that the cat had assured him was clear of Ashborn.

The cat automaton stalked back into the room, pawed at Draco until he sat down on the bed, and climbed into his lap. It was much larger, more awkward, and colder than a real feline would be, but it still wound its tail around itself, kneaded his leg with its paws, and attempted a rumbling purr.

Draco blinked at it as he scratched at the furless head. Had Severus really given it an impulse to jealousy like this? Or was the spirit that he had filled the metallic frame with more powerful than he knew, more prone to attempt some kind of life?

Then he put such thoughts aside, because he was picturing the expression on Weasley's face and Granger's when Harry walked in with a dragon perched on his shoulder. He didn't have to picture Harry's expression. He had already seen it, and was more than satisfied, although a soft ache pulsed in him that wouldn't stop until Harry returned to the fortress.

_Let it be soon. How fast can a month pass?_

* * *

The dragon came down like a silver comet towards Harry where he stood in the long grass outside the Burrow, watching the sky.

He raised his arm instinctively, for the dragon to land on, although he doubted it would be enough considering the animal's speed. But the dragon backwinged above him and landed on his arm as delicately as a heavy butterfly. Then it lowered its head towards him and crooned. It was an unexpectedly smooth dragon, Harry thought. He remembered the Hungarian Horntail he'd fought as being all lumps and bumps. Then again, this dragon didn't have a ruff or spiky chin beard the way some of them did, and its horns were short and swept backwards along its spine.

Then he caught sight of its eyes, and stared. He had only ever seen that color in the mirror or photographs of his mum.

_I wonder how he knew to get the color exactly right? _

The natural conclusion to his thoughts made Harry flush, and he lowered his arm so that the dragon was in front of him instead of above him. It braced its forelegs on his shoulders and crooned into his face. Harry expected to have to flinch from its breath, but really, it had a tinge of sweetness that was-sort of pleasant. Perhaps a little smoky, which added a whole new worry to Harry's pile. Draco hadn't made the bloody thing able to breathe _real _fire, had he?

The bloody thing under consideration wrapped itself around Harry's shoulders like a cloak, purring all the while. Its tail, ending in a single perfect diamond shape, draped down his back in the moments before the dragon coiled it up and brought it to hang down his chest instead. Harry felt the warmth blazing through the bright, silver-tissue skin, and had to laugh helplessly as he stroked the dragon's neck. Yes, Draco had made it able to breathe fire, which was really the perfect representation of their relationship when Harry thought about it: what would it be without that touch of danger?

"Harry! What _is _that thing? Don't move!"

And there was Ron, returning at exactly the wrong time from his second visit to Hogwarts with Hermione. Harry sighed and turned around. The dragon had stopped crooning and started growling, though the sound was so low Harry only knew it existed because of the way the dragon was draped around him.

"It's all right," Harry called, watching the way Ron's wand wavered. He relaxed. His best friend would still trust him, then, in spite of everything weird happening between them lately. That was good to know. "This is a gift from Draco. He made it from magic and some really complicated spells, I think." He touched the dragon on the head, and it stopped growling and turned its chin in the right direction, because Harry wanted it to. "Look, it has my eyes."

Ron stopped, blinking. Hermione was the one who squealed and ran towards the dragon, her hand stretched out. The dragon started to rear up, spreading its wings, but Harry touched its chin again, and it calmed down and let Hermione stroke the way its spine arched along its back, practically visible as a serious of diamond-like humps above the silver scales, although it never stopped growling.

_Yes, you did give me a protector, and a friend and a companion and a jealous pet, _Harry thought at Draco, giving a mental roll of his eyes. _I'm sure that you knew it would respond like this to my friends, too._

"Come touch it, Ron!" Hermione let one finger skim along the side of the dragon's jaw, close to the fangs that shone like ivory. The dragon wanted to move and snap her finger off, but Harry tapped it on the nose and it kept its mouth closed. Hermione gave him a curious glance, but didn't show any other sign that she knew how close she'd come to getting something bitten. "It doesn't feel like scales at all right here, it just feels like smooth silver skin!"

That made Harry look at the dragon in some concern, wondering if someone could hurt it if they hit the corner of the jaw. The dragon turned its head in silent answer, and Harry saw the way the skin shimmered like a mirror, how close the shine was to the shine of the Shield Charm. He calmed down. No, he didn't think the dragon could be hurt, unless someone was really lucky or used an extremely powerful spell.

"What are you going to name it, Harry?" Hermione continued breathlessly. Ron had approached, but was looking without enthusiasm at the dragon's claws. They bent like grass blades where they gripped Harry's shoulder, but he was sure that they could grow hard against an enemy. "Do you think I could learn the spells to make one for myself? It's _beautiful._"

"I think someone else has to make it for you, unless you know yourself really well," Harry said slowly, answering the easier question first. "And-" He stared at the dragon, whose wings went up in answer, the sky and the grass and the trees flashing in shining reflections across them.

Harry looked at its skin again, and smiled.

"Shield," he said.

* * *

Severus listened with half an ear to the conversation between Incognita and Draco, concerning the reconciliation of the werewolves and the centaurs and what either side could bring to the conversation. It was not yet his fight, though it might become so in the future. If Draco invited werewolves to the fortress, then Severus would find out why and whether it was wise to allow them in.

But in the meantime, he was thinking about something else, something that made him pick even at his meal.

Today was the day that the Ministry ball with Harry as the guest of honor was supposed to happen. Severus had worked out the exact wording of the letter Harry should send them in return, and would not have worried, except-

He turned his head and stared at the parchment resting next to his elbow.

Except for the cryptic owl he had received from Harry an hour ago, saying only, _Ministry not responsive. Going._

Severus shook his head, frowning, and then instinctively stopped himself, though another glance at Incognita and Draco showed they were too deeply involved in their own discussion to look around. Would Harry not have firecalled him rather than owled him if something about their plan turned out not to work?

Then Severus remembered he had been in his lab all afternoon and evening, working on a complicated potion to attack existing variations of influenza, with the Floo shut down because even a minor interruption would ruin hours of work. He grimaced and wondered why the thought of Harry trying frantically to contact him and not succeeding made his chest go cold and still.

_He can handle himself. If the Ministry tried to imprison him, you know his friends would break through the gates of Hell itself to find him. And the Ministry knows about the Unbreakable Vows. They know they would have the Ashborn on their throats if they prevented him from returning to us._

Then Severus had a thought that made him curl his fingers around the bottom of his glass and fight back a snarl.

Unbreakable Vows remained an uncommon kind of oath, the plethora of important ones in recent history notwithstanding, because they did not take circumstances into account. If someone failed to keep his promise made by such a Vow, the Vow would kill him, whether he had failed due to his own will or because of incompetence or because someone who didn't know about the Vow had stood in his way.

The Ministry knew about the Vows, yes. They might also know that imprisoning Harry and keeping him from reaching the Ashborn by the time the month ended would kill Harry and rid them of a problem. They might even claim that they were doing it simply out of concern for Harry's welfare, because he couldn't be _happy_ as a guest of the Ashborn.

Severus touched the thought in his mind and turned it over, freezing it and making himself consider it from a distance, the way he would have the idea for a potion he had become too attached to. Yes, this might be a trap. But he should remember other things, such as that Harry would not go to the ball unaccompanied. If his friends did not come with him, Draco's dragon would. Harry had contacted Draco by firecall yesterday to gush rapturously over the beast, which rode Harry's shoulder and would not be parted from him.

With that realization loosening his throat, Severus returned to his meal. The meat tonight was a particularly fragrant duck, softened by soaking in a sauce that Severus did not recognize off the top of his head. He was glad he had chosen to employ house-elves, and not Ashborn, in the kitchen. They could make dishes Severus was not personally familiar with while at the same time exciting no fear of poisoning in him.

"Severus!"

That voice still brought him to his feet and his hand to his wand despite the Mark on his arm that proclaimed the entire death of the Dark Lord. Incognita also had her wand drawn and had moved to cover Draco, he noted. Good. She knew what was good for her and would shield Draco against most enemies. He once again swallowed to loosen his throat and scanned for the threat.

He saw it, and took off running towards it. Not a threat, but the thing that should have triggered the wards and did not. Of course, why would it, when one of them had been made by Draco and one had had access to the private quarters of the Ashborn's lord?

Harry staggered along, coughing, supported more by the dragon gripping his shoulders and beating its wings furiously than by his own legs. His left hand, and the left side of his face, and the rest of the left side of his body, was burned, red and black. He took in a gasping, heaving breath, and the tiny cold slice of Severus's mind that had frozen his concern earlier diagnosed smoke inhalation. The dragon stuck its head around and crooned at Severus, then growled when Harry tried to pull away from it.

"Harry! What happened? Did he burn you?" Draco was there already, his arms around Harry's waist. Harry shook his head and leaned against Draco for a moment, but then tried to pull away and stand. Draco, who evidently hadn't seen the headshake, continued with the obsessive mutters that Severus knew indicated a downwards spiral had begun in his mood and thoughts. "I never would have made the dragon if I thought it would burn _you_-I'm sorry-"

"Draco," Severus said as he continued past him, rapping his knuckles lightly on Draco's shoulder to get his attention. "The dragon didn't burn Harry. He couldn't, not if you made him properly. His fire would be harmless to Mr. Potter. No, Harry had an appointment at the Ministry tonight that he evidently kept." He locked his eyes on Harry's and waited for a response.

"Right," Harry said, with a faint smile. "They tried a firetrap. A literal one," he added, and laughed, as though joking with someone he could not see. Severus hoped it was that, at least, and not a joke that he was supposed to understand. "Shield started beating his wings and screaming the moment I stepped into the Ministry, and I understood that someone was probably aiming at me. But, fool that I am, I didn't take the danger literally. I just tried to calm him down and get to the center of the room, where they told me the Minister was standing to award me an Order of Merlin."

Severus nodded in response, but he was already bending down and examining the burns on Harry's hand, and manipulating the fingers back and forth. Harry's wince was enough to convince him to back off, but also to meet Draco's eyes and mouth, "Burn salve, my lab, now." Draco took off at a run, without even a protest about not getting to hear the end of the story. Severus was sure that he would have it out of Harry later, at any rate.

"They-they had a few Aurors with fire spells on their wands waiting there instead." Harry coughed, and Severus cast a few spells that would soothe his lungs before pulling out a pain potion from the corner of his sleeve. Harry grimaced, perhaps because of the taste or because of Incognita's wondering, watching eyes, but accepted it and drank it. He swayed on his feet when it was done, and Shield crooned and beat his wings in response, hauling him back upright again. Severus offered his own arm as support, silently cursing himself for not doing it before. Harry nodded gratefully, and leaned against him. "They stood in a circle around me, so it was harder to escape. But Shield deflected one of the spells, and I raised a Shield Charm around me, too." The dragon nudged Harry hard with its sleek silver nose and concentrated on beating its wings to hold him up.

"One of your Shield Charms, and yet some of the fire got through?" Severus asked, in his driest voice, to hold Harry's attention away from the bright symbols provided by his wordless diagnostic spell. They worried him. Harry had swallowed far more smoke than seemed reasonable based on his story, and he was burned more badly than it would seem to warrant, too.

Harry's eyelids flickered. Severus leaned down until he was at his eye level and waited for Harry to figure out that lying would make no sense.

Harry swallowed, which made him cough, although less strongly than before, and said, "Ron and Hermione were with me, too. I concentrated on protecting them first, and I didn't renew the Shield Charm in time. And then-um, Shield was trying to burn the people who were attacking me. I didn't want him to hurt them. I had to restrain him, and they cooked me."

Severus held back a shout with difficulty. He sent up a vague prayer of thanks, for the first time, that Harry Potter had Sorted Gryffindor; he would have gone mad if he had had to deal with being the boy's Head of House. "That is what the dragon is _for_," he said. "To hurt the ones who hurt you."

Harry's jaw thrust out. "No, he's to protect me. That's different."

Draco, coming back just at that moment, shook his head when Severus opened his mouth. Severus did not entirely wish to shut up, as Draco seemed to be suggesting, but he stepped back and half-bowed his head so that Draco could talk to Harry and put salve on the burns. Shield examined him suspiciously for a moment, then pulled back his head and tail so that Draco could reach the worst of the burns mottling the left side of Harry's face and neck.

_To a Gryffindor, perhaps defense is always different than offense, _Severus decided grudgingly. He said, with the patience that dealing with incompetent Potions students had taught him, "And then what happened?"

"We did manage to fight our way out of there, once Ron and Hermione got over the shock," Harry said. He coughed again, and Severus cast another spell to ease his breathing. Harry sighed and tried to stand upright, away from Draco's supporting arms. Draco only pulled him back down as if it were coincidence and he needed to reach a spot on the back of Harry's hand. Harry accepted it with an ease that told Severus more than anything how weary he was. "And they wanted to take me to St. Mungo's, but Shield hissed and snapped even at them, and I didn't—still don't—want anyone from the wizarding world fussing over me and lying to the Ministry for me. So I came here."

"Because Shield trusts us," Draco said, and stroked the dragon's tail where it coiled around Harry's neck. Shield responded with a single, anxious croon, and bent his neck down so he could study what Draco was doing from closer to.

"Right, of course," Harry said, turning his head at the same time. "That was the main reason."

He met Draco's eyes, and for a moment Severus thought he would smile, the best complement to his apparently joking tone. But his wide green eyes stayed fixed on Draco's, and widened. Draco stared back, still unsmiling, and then reached up and dabbed a bit of the salve on just under Harry's eye, with such a gentle touch that there was no reason for Harry to flinch a little and suck in a small breath. Draco laid his fingers flat once the burn was covered, letting them hover there above the skin.

"So," Severus said, because watching Harry and Draco share a private moment was no easier for him than watching their Vows without participating probably had been for Draco. "You realize the value of what happened to you?"

"If you mean it taught me I still have enemies in the Ministry," Harry said, turning his head away from Draco slowly, "then yes. But then, I really knew that already."

"It will give you more material for blackmail," Severus said, vaguely surprised that Harry had not seen this earlier. _But perhaps he is still so Gryffindor in so many other ways that I should not be surprised. _"They attacked you in the middle of a ball. There are witnesses."

"The only witnesses that I would trust to back me up are my friends," Harry said bitterly. "The Aurors will support each other. Most of the other people there are probably either Ministry flunkies or could legitimately claim they couldn't see what was going on and I might have attacked first. And you could say things." His hand took Severus's wrist in a grip that was almost painful. "But they won't listen to anything you say, either."

Severus took his wrist in return, stroking carefully up and down to avoid the faint burns he could see even there, and shook his head. "Blackmail need not always be true, and we can move faster than they can. Send your story to the papers _now_, Harry."

Harry blinked. "If we tell everyone, it's not blackmail material anymore, is it?"

"We tell them a modified version of the story," Draco said, and looked up, and smiled at both of them. Severus felt a bit of the tight jealousy coiled in his stomach unwind, seeing that smile. "We keep the real, worse version in reserve, and send them an owl explaining that. If they back down and apologize, or make a deal with us to stop trying to control your life, then you'll get what you want without having to risk another confrontation."

"So, lying," Harry said. Severus could read nothing from the tone of his voice.

"Of course," Draco said, shrugging.

"I don't like to lie," Harry said. "It makes it too easy for your enemies to trip you up with the truth."

"The Ministry will not risk the truth in this case," Severus said smoothly, trying not to let his pride in Harry seeing sense like that—having a sensible reason to care about the truth, rather—influence his words. "It makes them look worse. They will try a lie of their own, perhaps that you attacked them instead, or that they feared you had gone mad and wanted to take you down for your own good. We must use both our speed and the power of your name."

Harry made a disgusted noise. "Politics."

Draco nodded. "Of course. And as long as you live, you'll play those games. Ordinary people don't have to, maybe, but we have a shortage of ordinary people who kill Dark Lords and then sacrifice themselves to save the world."

"Part of the world," Harry muttered, but he hesitated. Then he said, "You really think—will you help me explain this to Ron and Hermione? That will be the hardest part, explaining why I left them tonight and why I'm lying."

Draco met Severus's eyes, and said nothing. He did not have to. The thought burning in both their minds was the same. _He chose us. He came to us, without them. That is worth everything._

Of course, one of the stupidest things they could do at the moment would be to demonstrate that they were thinking like that, with Harry trying to think of how to apologize to his friends. They would not banish the other Gryffindors from his life, Severus knew, and for the source of contentment and support they could occasionally be to Harry, he did not wish to. But Harry no longer belonged solely with them, either.

"Yes, we can explain that," Severus said smoothly. "They shall have the spell theory behind Draco's creation of the dragon, if they wish, and that may help indicate how loyal he is to you." He lifted one eyebrow at Draco, who took over with soothing chatter about how Shield would know and trust Harry's friends eventually, but not while he was in the middle of a dangerous situation. Severus examined Harry's burns, and nodded when he found the salve had already begun to make them less vivid. Harry would survive this, and yet still make an impressive picture for the papers.

Severus turned his mind to the Ministry. He knew too little of their new internal structure and politics to say for certain who would have thought it worth the risk to order this assassination attempt on Harry, but he did know one thing:

The Ministry would be sorry for this by the time they were done.


	28. Comparing Scars

Thank you again for all the reviews!

_Chapter Twenty-Eight—Comparing Scars_

Severus laid down the list of names and positions that Incognita had prepared for him, swearing softly.

No, it was worse than he had imagined. He had thought he would find familiar names in the list among the Minister's undersecretaries and most important flunkies, that he could easily locate, that way, whoever had wanted Harry dead more than they had cared about the potential embarrassment to the Ministry.

There was not _one _familiar name. There were dozens. Severus shuddered as he stared at the list again. People related to Cornelius Fudge, people related to Umbridge, people related to Rita Skeeter and the Blacks—and Severus had been in the right circles, just before Albus's death, to hear people muttering about how the last legitimate Black heir had left everything to Potter—and others whose names went back centuries, mostly tangled in complicated feuds with the Potters.

Not to mention those who hated Muggleborns enough to perhaps strike at someone famous with a Muggleborn mother, but not enough to join the Dark Lord.

Severus reached out and stroked the Mark on Bellatrix's arm with his thoughts. She was there in seconds, holding a steaming cup of tea. Severus picked it up and sipped it, his eyes closed.

"Master."

It was rare for Bellatrix to volunteer a thought on her own. Severus opened his eyes and looked at her wearily, but signaled her to go on when she hesitated. Bellatrix sane enough to control and serve as a guard did sometimes mean a Bellatrix sane enough to feel wary that she was annoying her Lord.

"An owl crossed the wards this morning," she said.

Severus nodded, understanding. Many owls came, from people wanting to send him Howlers to those wanting to propose an alliance with the Ashborn, and most of them were dealt with before they came to him. Greyback would place a small store of important letters on his desk every morning. "Yes? Who was it from?"

"No sender was named. The handwriting is not familiar." Bellatrix's words became more crisp and regular again as she settled back into the role he had woven to contain her. "But this is the letter, and it contains a threat and a promise." She held out a sheet of creamy parchment, the sort that many pure-bloods could afford.

_And so can others, _Severus reminded himself, and opened the letter, which had been folded in half. He murmured a spell as he did so to lock in magical signatures. If not many people had handled this before the sender owled it, and only he and Bellatrix after its arrival, he stood a chance of getting a decent signature out of it. Otherwise, he would receive only a meaningless buzz of noise and scent, like listening to many voices speaking at once.

The letter was two sentences, in a delicate, dipping handwriting that made Severus visualize old handwriting teachers and jade inkwells, but which he did not recognize any more than Bellatrix had.

_We can do worse to him, and you know it. Give him over, and we will give you much else in return._

Severus waited through the ringing silence that filled his head. Then he smiled and folded the paper into a series of quarters. He did not check for magical signatures as yet. The anger would make him clumsy and careless.

_Rather like the writer._

"Sir?" Bellatrix hovered near him. "Do you want me to put the letter somewhere safe, or destroy it, or—"

"Yes, keep it safe, by all means," Severus murmured, handing it over. "In a cupboard where it stands no chance of coming into contact with magical materials. I do not want the signature contaminated." He would have kept it in his lab, but there, there was too much chance of Potions fumes or the subtler effusions from some of his ingredients ruining the spell.

Bellatrix bowed to him and moved with alacrity, ducking out of the lab. Severus laid his hands together behind his head and watched the dancing flames of the fire under the nearest cauldron. It was a small, focused point of light compared to the great hearth he _could _have been staring into, but at the moment, that suited his mood.

Who would have dared to send a threat? Who would have dared to attack Harry in the first place? Severus could hope that the questions would both have the same answer, but he didn't yet know what that answer was, or where to begin looking for it. The list of names by itself was not helpful, and neither was thinking of those who might be jealous of Harry's fame, or who might fear the Ashborn. They were too many, there were too many whom he might not be thinking of, and…

Severus paused. Then he sat up and shook his head.

Of course. There were things he could do to eliminate some of the suspects. He had not thought of them because he was too used to using the Ashborn merely as servants or guards for himself, and not as spies. But there were some whose abilities under his control were greater than he had given them space to show. He could send them to the Ministry as "rebels," and the Ministry, while suspicious at first, could not be suspicious enough to avoid showing some sign. There were always those who would welcome Dark wizards supposedly fleeing from a Dark Lord's control and needing political allies. Look at how easy it had been for Lucius and others to pretend that they had been under Imperius during the first war. The people who mattered knew it was a lie, but it was a useful one, and had taken him back and used him as a tool and been used themselves. If they thought they could establish the same sort of reciprocal alliance with the Ashborn, they would do so.

And Severus could give the Ashborn the words to say that would make it seem as if they weren't his willing servants, as if they never had been even when he supposedly had absolute control over them.

_Not your willing servants. Your will-less servants. _

Severus winced when he thought of that, and leaned back, looking away from the fire at last. He had not considered it, but it was true that Harry would probably object to Severus using the Ashborn in such a way. He did not like the fact that they were servants at all, and would not want to place them in danger.

But they had come to an understanding about Incognita, and about Harry staying in the fortress overnight to calm Shield and make sure his burns and smoke inhalation were completely cured. Before that, they had arranged for mutual reading of each other's minds. Severus was much more confident than he had been before the first set of Vows that they could come to some sort of accommodation.

* * *

"Hold still so I can put the burn salve on."

Harry rolled his eyes, but stayed still. He had to admit that was more because of Draco's wide-eyed stare of concentration than any other reason. It was cute, and he could see it better staying still like this, and so being allowed close, than he could from further away.

Draco looked as if putting the burn salve in the wrong place would kill Harry, or cause him wounds more severe than the burns. And, well, Harry had to admit that the salve cooled the burns off, and he had been grateful to Draco more than once in the night when he woke up, felt the pain but also found it was bearable, and drifted off again. That didn't mean he thought it was worth as much fervency as Draco threw into the task.

When Draco stepped back and studied his placement of the salve with a critical nod, Harry blew out his breath and smiled at him. Then Draco moved forwards, one hand reaching out so that he could take Harry's chin and turn his head to the side. Harry allowed it, but blinked. The salve was all over the burns on the side of his face and neck, as far as he knew.

"There are more under your collar," Draco said. "Take off your shirt, Harry."

He said the words in a flat, normal tone, which made Harry flush more than he would have if Draco had spoken to him in a deeper voice, or with more inflection. As it was, he felt Shield, curled up on the headboard near his pillows, lift his head with a warning rumble. Harry reached out a hand to calm him down, without taking his eyes from Draco. "You—you want me to do that?" he asked. "Without Snape here?"

Draco leaned back against air. The small pot of burn salve was in one hand; his other one was empty, and caught the air and twisted it, a contrast to his calm body and absolutely straight spine. Harry found himself watching it. Draco saw him doing it, and gave a small shrug, his hand falling straight down. "We need to do it," he said. "And yeah. I want you to."

Harry felt more heat licking his body, and couldn't tell what came from the blush and what came from the burns and what came from—something else, if he was honest with himself. He swallowed and pulled his shirt back and over his head, and ignored the motion Shield made to wrap himself around Harry's shoulders. He wasn't cold.

At least, not with anything more than anticipation.

Draco moved forwards, his eyes flickering as though he wanted to be serious and wanted to smile at the same time. Harry glanced down, and blinked himself when he saw the burns on his chest. He had been sure they didn't get through his clothes and the Shield Charm, because they hadn't hurt last night. Or had Snape and Draco already cast spells that eased the pain by then? He shook his head. He didn't have that much memory of last night, or at least not much memory that wasn't sensation.

"You—don't want me near?"

Harry glanced up, and realized that Draco had stopped moving, perhaps because he'd seen Harry shake his hand. "I want you," Harry replied, and then flushed again as he realized how Draco would probably take that sentence. Sometimes it felt so huge and horrible and _awkward_, this thing between them, all the history they had to ignore, including the history of how he had come here. But he held out his hand, and he didn't pull away.

Draco came towards him again, and there was a faint smile on his face. Maybe he was mocking his own worry, Harry thought, leaning his head back on the pillow and turning to one side. He felt Draco's hands smooth salve over the burns on the side of his chest, and then pause. A finger traced what felt like a particularly large one.

"You have a scar here," Draco said.

_Oh_. Harry looked back, and looked at Draco's finger instead of his eyes. "I'm amazed you can see it under the burn," he said.

There was a faint rustle as Draco knelt beside him, his hand still in place, hovering over the burn, and the scar beneath, and asked the question with nothing more than a tilt of his head and a glow in his eyes.

Harry swallowed. "All right," he said. "So, okay."

Draco's smile broadened. "This sounds like an embarrassing story," he said. "Is it? Did I find the scar where the Great Harry Potter impaled himself in on a tree branch as he was running away through the forest?"

Harry tried to smile, but his face felt crowded and anxious, and he dropped it in a second. "No," he said. "It's just that—I haven't _told _anyone about my scars. Ron and Hermione were present for a lot of them and saw them happen, so I didn't have to tell the stories. And no one who asked about them after the war ever actually saw them, so I could put them off with any made-up stories I wanted. But you're here, and you're asking. I have to put it into words for you."

He had thought the weight of his words might oppress Draco, but Draco leaned nearer, his eyes so bright and intense that Harry thought he might burst into flame.

"_Tell me_," Draco breathed. "I want to be the first one to hear the story of your scars. Tell me." His hand spread out flat, covering both burn and scar.

Harry closed his eyes and tried to marshal his breath, or perhaps just his courage, before he continued. He reached out and covered Draco's hand, and that acted like an anchor, made everything more real. He listened, and thought he could hear the slow pounding of Draco's heart, unnaturally slow given how excited he seemed.

And that thought would distract him, if he let it, with more visions of Draco "excited." Harry sighed in irritation and began the story, wondering if he should be grateful for the break from the intensity of before.

"You-Know-Who guarded some of his—treasures with snakes." He had a hard time talking about Horcruxes with anyone except Ron and Hermione. It was probably fine now, but, well, he wasn't going to try and change that particular habit in the middle of his first intimate conversation with Draco. "I could talk to them in Parseltongue, of course, and he got tired of having them stolen because I would convince the snakes to slither aside. He came up with a new kind of snake. Or else he bred it, from Nagini. I think it was one of her hatchlings. It looked like her."

"I don't need to think about the Dark Lord's snake having sex, thank you very much," Draco muttered. Harry held back a snort at the thickness in his voice, and the way his hand flexed shut for a second, as though throttling a serpent.

Then his hand spread out again, flat on Harry's skin, and Harry didn't have the urge to snort at all. He continued in a voice that he hoped wasn't breathless, but probably sounded that way.

"He put the snake at the back entrance of a cave. We thought we were so clever, getting in to steal some of Vol—Old Snake-Face's hoard and coming out through a tunnel we didn't think he knew about. But the snake was waiting."

Harry fell silent. Because he could see, even now, the way the snake had uncoiled from the ground, so slowly that he thought it was a drifting ribbon of mist at first. He could see the way its fangs had aimed towards Hermione, and hear the hiss he had used to attract its attention to him. Nothing more than Parseltongue for _Attack me, you idiot!_ Usually, it would have made the snake cower in confusion. They weren't used to hearing a human who gave them orders and wasn't Voldemort.

But this one had turned towards him, and its eyes—

Its eyes were almost the color of his. Not exactly, not the shade of green that Draco had managed to achieve with Shield, but close enough that Harry had felt something inside him stir and flow, pulled towards the snake.

"Then what happened?" Draco's voice interrupted his memories.

Harry sighed and opened his eyes. Thinking about what had happened next wasn't his favorite activity. Perhaps talking about it would actually make the incident seem simpler, flatter, something he could handle from a distance and not have so many nightmares about. "The snake tried to bite Hermione. I yelled, and it came for me instead. Vold—sorry, Stubborn Tom had given it eyes like mine somehow. And it started tugging my soul out of me. I don't know how. It didn't feel like the times I've come too close to a Dementor. But I could feel it holding on. I _think_ there was something like me in it, close enough that it attracted that part of my soul that would stay with me most of the time."

"Well, of course," Draco said, as if that was a simple conclusion, or something he had heard before. Harry blinked at him, wondering where he would have encountered snakes with soul-stealing eyes, and Draco shrugged back at him, his head tilted to one side. "The magic that I used to make Shield was like that."

Shield's wings rustled out from the headboard, as if he wanted to hide Harry from sight simply on hearing his name. Harry reached up to caress his neck, still staring at Draco. "You used your _soul_ to make him?"

"Magic that contacts the soul," Draco said, and gazed at him, obviously waiting for the rest of the story.

_I didn't know. I knew he had to invoke me and know himself well to make a dragon like this, but I didn't realize how deep he went, how much of a risk he took._

Harry turned his hand over and gripped Draco's, because he wanted to. Draco blinked, but Harry immersed himself in the story again, making himself remember the moment when the snake had stared into him.

"I saw—the people I could have been," he said. "The snake was showing me parts of my soul, ones that could have influenced me more than they did."

"You knew that at the time?" Draco's voice was soft, but devoid of emotion; he might have been impressed, frightened, skeptical, or none of those.

"No," Harry admitted. "I figured it out later, with Hermione's help." He hesitated, wondering if he really wanted to tell Draco about some of the things that he had seen in the snake's eyes.

"I'm waiting, Potter."

Harry half-smiled. He would never mistake the slight impatience in Draco's voice for true anger again, not when he knew what Draco had done for him. He leaned his head back and let Shield's wing caress his forehead before he answered.

"I saw myself a Dark wizard worse than _him_," he said. That had been the greatest number of images, the most prominent path he could have taken. All of them, whirling around and showing him standing at the edge of a cliff, plunging into the sea and poisoning the waters of the world, slaying hundreds with a storm he had called, making the earth move and swallow up a village because someone in it had annoyed him, creating potions that were responsible for the spread of subtle and incurable diseases. "I would have been a lot worse than he was, because he didn't have much imagination, or much empathy."

"That made him good at torturing people, Potter," Draco interrupted. His thumb had sunk into Harry's wrist, hard enough to make him wince as it pressed down on the tendon. But he said nothing. Draco's voice was—blank, somehow. Enough to make Harry think that he needed time to absorb what Harry was talking about, time that Harry intended to give him.

"Yes, but not good at understanding them," Harry pointed out quietly. "He couldn't come up with ways to hurt them beyond the most obvious, like torturing them. I could have. And I would have been terrible on a global level because I wasn't obsessed with killing Muggles or killing a _boy_, like he was. I would have torn apart my friends' lives first, and then hurt anyone else who hurt me. For fun."

"And you think that's inside you?"

Draco was shrinking away from him as much as he could while still holding Harry's wrist. Harry knew why. He had seen that memory of Draco and Snape sitting in the dungeons, after all. Draco had suffered at the hands of a madman who had commanded him to do the impossible, and he knew what it was like, to be that victim, that hurting boy. Harry doubted he would ever forget.

"I know it is," Harry replied, and didn't look away from Draco's eyes, because he would never find the courage to look back again. "Because that snake reflected my soul. It's there, along with the beauty that you saw, or imagined, when you made Shield for me. That's part of me, Draco, not the whole. But in a different world, I could have gone a different way."

Draco flinched once. Then he lifted his head, and his jaw was set, and Harry reached out and smoothed the hair back from his forehead. He had done that with Ron and Hermione once, too, when they fully realized that they had set themselves up for as bitter and vicious a war as they had.

But they hadn't run, and Draco had decided not to run, just now. Harry couldn't keep from smiling, he was so very proud of him.

Draco bristled, for some reason, and avoided his gaze as he said, "Tell me what else you saw in the snake's eyes."

"All the futures I could have had," Harry said, and he kept his voice gentle, but not mocking, not anywhere close, because he didn't want Draco to think that he didn't understand his emotions. "I could have been a spoiled child, or died as a child, or lived with my parents and had the happiest life I could ever imagine." He was glad that that vision had been so small and quickly over. It had hurt worse than the revelation that he could kill people and be glad of it; by that point in the war, he had started to suspect that. "Or my relatives could have killed me. Or _he _could have. All the many and varied ways that I could die. That was a big part of it. I reckon death's always hunted me."

Draco nodded, staring at the bed with burning eyes. "And that was the reason you have the scar? Because the magic burned you?"

Harry snorted. "No. Because I was so caught up in what I was seeing that I forgot the snake was striking at me, as well as trying to draw my soul out of my body. It hit my side, and that left the scar you see." He looked down at their joined hands and swung his a little, so that Draco's had to swing along with it. "So there you have it. Not that much in reality, and when the snake struck me, I snapped out of the vision and killed it. Hermione gave me the antidote we'd developed by that point for Nagini's venom, and I was fine."

"No," Draco said, his voice heavy as a sheet of lead. "You lived. But you weren't fine."

Harry sighed. This had been what he was a little afraid of, when he started sharing his memories, first with Snape and now with Draco. He didn't want them to become caught up in those memories to the point that they started seeing them as _all _he was. Yes, Harry had been hurt, and he hadn't healed as completely as he should have. But he wanted to live now, and Draco and Snape were the ones helping him do that. They couldn't if they turned back and focused all their energy on the child abuse victim, or "the poor Boy-Who-Lived, so young for his great destiny," which was a phrase one of the _Prophet _articles after the war had used for him.

"I will be," he said, and squeezed Draco's hand until Draco looked up. "You didn't heal from the war, either, did you? I saw Snape's memory of you in the dungeons, the day that he told you he hoped I would win the war. You looked horrible."

"It was—it wasn't what you endured," Draco said.

"Yeah," Harry said. "But I didn't have to go through losing my family when I was old enough to know them, either." Draco choked and started to pull away, but Harry tugged him closer to the bed. "Come on, why should I be the only one who has to talk about horrible secrets here? Or don't talk about it if you'd rather," he added, because Draco had twisted his head away until his chin was buried in the shoulder opposite the one Harry was holding. "Just—be with me. Think about it. Think about yourself, for once. I want you to."

* * *

_Since when? _Draco wanted to ask. Sometimes Harry acted as if the last thing he was interested in was another display of childishness.

But that had been before he left the fortress, and since then, Draco had been his Bonder in the second set of Unbreakable Vows and made him a dragon. Draco suspected that made more than a minor difference. He picked up his sodden mind from its cowering puddle of emotions and made himself breathe out.

"The war was hard for me because I kept hoping," he said. "Sometimes I thought about giving in to despair, and I think that would have been better."

"No, it wouldn't."

Harry's voice got a _tone _when he was certain of something, as though no one else in the entire world would be right while he was busy being that way. Draco looked up at him, blinked, and shook his head.

"You say that as if you think something specific would have happened if I despaired," he said. "It wouldn't. Severus was right there with me, and he had sworn to save me. He would have guarded me and protected me even if I faltered."

"It doesn't matter." Harry's mouth was still set in a small, stubborn line, making him look rather like a painted doll as he leaned towards Draco. A doll with green glass eyes and red and black paint splashed on the side of his face, Draco reminded himself. Somehow, this had stopped being about healing Harry's burns and become about Draco instead, and Draco would have guided the conversation back round in the right direction if he could have remembered how they got here. "I still think you would have fought less hard for your life, and then one of two things would have happened. You would have died during the war because you didn't care anymore, or you would have gone down into Snape's shadow when he made the Ashborn and not come out. You were broken-down when I got here as it was."

Draco bristled. "I would have found _some _way out of it."

"Yeah? You walked around with him like you were Ashborn, did you know that? When we saw you at the hostage exchange." Harry settled back in the bed and frowned at him in a way that made Shield rattle his wings. Harry reached back as if to quiet him, and then exhaled loudly and said, "That's part of the reason that I can't call him Severus yet, you know."

"Keep in mind, Potter, that not all of us have a mind that leaps to conclusions as readily as your own," Draco said, and used the haughty snap that his father had sometimes used when fighting with his mother. Then he winced at reminding himself of his parents, and wondered if he would look even more pathetic to Harry because of it.

Harry shook his head. "I meant that I can't call him Severus because of what he did to you. And some of the others. I can accept, just barely, that you might need to put bonds on someone like Bellatrix or Fenrir Greyback if you weren't going to execute them. But Incognita? Some of the other Death Eaters I know got conned into following _him_? The way he treated you? There's no excuse for that."

"And here you've been talking as if you could have forgiven him," Draco snapped, and pulled his hands away. He still had to put more burn salve on Harry, but for later. Right now he had to leap to his feet and pace around the room. "Have you mentioned this, in the middle of all the firecalls and letters and letting him touch you?"

Harry flushed, but didn't look away, and leaned forwards as if he thought he could convince Draco that way. Draco folded his arms and didn't touch him in return, although he knew Harry would have liked him to. Harry took a breath and released it in a mutter that sounded suspiciously as if he was praying for patience.

"I think I can forgive him," Harry said. "Eventually. But part of that is hearing what it was like for you when you were—living in his shadow." Draco smiled, because Harry had obviously considered other words and wouldn't have liked what would have happened if he had said anything about "slavery." Harry perhaps saw the smile from the corner of his eye and rushed on. "Why did that happen?"

"Because the war was done," Draco said quietly. "I didn't need to fight anymore. The worst had already happened."

Harry cocked his head. "And so you thought—what, that there was no future? That nothing would ever change? You would go on living under Snape's domination and studying, and he would command the Ashborn and brew, that was all?"

Draco drew his shoulders back. "I don't know that _you_ ever considered the future, either. You were a weapon to fight the Dark Lord, and then you were the sacrifice that would save the wizarding world yet again. Have you been listening to yourself? What did you think _you_ would do, but wear out your days among the Ashborn, moping and feeling sorry for yourself?"

Harry blinked, and then gave what sounded like a bark of laughter and shook his head. "You're right. Sorry. It sounds like we all have something to learn about living after the war, instead of withdrawing into ourselves and waiting for someone else to come along and heal our wounds."

Draco eyed Harry. He had relaxed, and Shield had retreated to the top of the headboard, his tail draped around and over his forepaws. He watched Draco with eyes like iced green glass, but looked less as if he might bite.

"It was like that," Draco said at last. "It was restful. I knew I couldn't bring my family back, but I dreamed about finding a pure-blood girl who lived in the old ways I was learning about from the books in the library and rearing a child in those old ways. Starting a Malfoy family who would remember their grandparents and honor them for their sacrifice."

Harry's lips tightened, but he didn't say something about "what sacrifice?", which Draco would have had to hit him for. He seemed to stare at the wall as if a fire flickered there, and then he just nodded. "Do you still think about that?" he asked. "About starting a family with the right pure-blood woman?"

"Yes," Draco said. "I explained the old alliance to you. There's provision in there for temporary marriages, and child contracts. And there's still a small number of pure-bloods in Great Britain who live by the oldest ways, although most of them marry and associate with people from the Continent. Or even further away. I want that life, Harry. I'm still working on the project that I was working on when you left, and I think I'll bring the werewolves into the alliance soon, if Thera agrees to visit Laughter with me."

"Laughter?" Harry frowned at him.

Draco smiled at him, rejoicing, more than he probably should have, in having this little bit of knowledge that Harry didn't. "The leader of the werewolves in the Forbidden Forest, the one who has the power to open negotiations with the centaurs if he wants. And negotiations with me." He paused a moment, then added casually, "Hilda Incognita can speak Mermish. That will make it easier to bring the merfolk in."

"You're going to try that?" Harry frowned more widely. "Even though the centaurs don't like them?"

Draco snorted. "There are times that I think Kleianthe and Thera hardly consider themselves _my_ allies. I won't allow them to dictate who should belong to the alliance as a whole."

Harry was silent for a second, picking at the blanket. Then he said, "That's—good. I know I don't think about the alliance in the same way you do, but that's good. You need a project that you can throw your whole heart and soul into." He lifted his eyes and caught Draco's. "And you need a way to learn proper pride."

"Right," Draco said, letting himself ease down a little from his crouch and smiling at Harry. "Someone was supposed to teach that to me and Severus, hmmm? It seems that we've been learning without him."

He'd reckoned that Harry would be upset when he heard that, but he gave a superior smile and leaned back on the pillow. "Teaching without even being there," he remarked to the ceiling. "I _am _good."

Draco allowed a few moments to pass while he silently reveled in the way Harry smiled at him and the fact that they could have an argument and Harry would realize he had done something worthwhile. But there were still the burns on Harry's face and chest, and he nodded to them as he said, "We have to find out who did this to you."

Harry bit his lip, and nodded. "There is someone who could find out for me."

"The Ashborn? Well, of course, but Severus would have to agree to sending them, and probably free them first—"

"No." Harry turned his head to the side as an abrupt trickle of water flowed from under the wall to the right. "Someone I already sent."

The horse-like head and bright eyes of Harry's water serpent friend lifted from the floor, and he hissed something in Parseltongue that made Harry laugh. Draco licked his lips. He wondered if Harry knew it made his hair stand on end when he heard the language—at least, the language as spoken by human lips, not the burbling voice the serpent used.

Harry hissed back and forth a few times, and then Corners flowed towards him and into the empty vial that Draco had used to hold the salve. Draco winced; he hadn't cleaned it out, not thinking it might be occupied in the next little while. Other than Corners flickering out an annoyed tongue, he didn't seem to care. His head vanished into the vial, and a moment later, no one would have known it was anything more than a tube of slightly murky water.

Shield was on his feet, Draco saw a moment later, his wings fanned out and his jaws parted as if he didn't know whether or not to breathe fire at the intruder. Draco felt much the same way. He sniffed and settled back, wondering what Severus would say when he found out Harry had anticipated their need to investigate. It was good to know, of course, but it would have been equally good to share the mystery and the search with Harry.

_At least this way we _will _know, and we have a way to find out the truth sooner, and that means Harry will be protected._

When he turned back to the bed, Harry had stopped laughing. Draco reached out without much thought and held his hand. Harry turned his hand over in response, and clutched back tightly.

"Did he find out that one of your friends is behind the attack?" Draco asked softly. That would be a reason for the ugly expression on Harry's face just now.

"Not—really," Harry said. "But Corners said that the Minister is talking about it. And his secretaries. And Percy Weasley, who still works in the Ministry." The corners of his eyes drew down as if in pain. "I don't think Percy betrayed me. Not really." _He says that as if he could convince himself, _Draco thought, and stroked the back of Harry's hand. "But he may have given them information about me and the way I fought, the way I would try to shield someone else first, that influenced them. Corners didn't find out exactly who planned the attack, but he was tired from traveling through the pipes. I'll send him again when he's rested."

Draco grimaced. It didn't feel as good as he had thought it would, after all, to know a Weasley might have betrayed Harry. "I'm sorry," he said.

"So am I," Harry said, and stared hollow-eyed at the wall.


	29. Getting to the Bottom

Thank you again for all the reviews!

_Chapter Twenty-Nine—Getting To the Bottom_

"You're all right."

It was the only thing Ron had been able to say since Harry firecalled him. Harry smiled and nodded, and shifted a little so that Ron couldn't see Shield crouching beside him like a talisman, head snapping in every direction. Ron might think that meant there was something frightening in the room with Harry, rather than it just being Shield's usual paranoia. "Fine. I was burned, yes, but Snape and Malfoy gave me salve for the burns. And Shield had protected me from the worst of it."

Ron leaned forwards until it looked like he was going to fall headlong into the fire and sprawl on the library's hearth. "You mean he _would _have protected you, if you had let him do it."

Harry sighed and used one hand to scratch Shield's spine. He arched up with a sound like an iron purr, but kept looking in all directions. Harry tried to imagine the dragon sleeping on his lap, contented as Draco's cat, and couldn't. Essential alertness seemed built in. "Yes. I've learned my lesson now. If I get into a situation like that again—"

"And you will, because you're Harry Potter," Ron interjected, making Harry smile at him.

"Then I'll let Shield take the brunt of the spells." Harry waved a hand to dismiss the attack at the Ministry. He and Ron had already discussed how it looked from Harry's perspective, what happened after he came back to the Ashborn's fortress, and all the things Harry had done wrong. Since that was the kind of thing Harry had talked about with Snape and Draco, too, he was more interested in fresh news. "What about you? Did you make it out of there all right?"

"One of their spells burned off all the hair on the left side of Hermione's head. Bastards."

Harry drew in a deep breath. He would have liked the person who cast that particular curse to see Ron right now, especially if he thought it impossible for Harry's friends to be dangerous because they were going back to Hogwarts in the autumn. Ron clenched a fist in front of him and continued.

"We were more worried about you than anyone else, but otherwise it was like—the war. Just fighting. You know I can't remember much about the individual battles." Ron smiled at him and then looked down at his fist as if trying to remember what in the world it was doing there. He dropped it to his side and blew out a harsh breath. "But I want to know who did this, and I want to be part of the group that takes them down."

"You think a group will?" Harry had thought Ron would counsel waiting, especially if he was worried about Hermione. Hermione certainly would. She had always wanted a map of the entire area and a plan, even a list of goals, before they attacked one of Voldemort's traps.

"I know what I saw when Malfoy bonded you," Ron said. "And the look in Snape's eyes when he held your hands. It's—weird, but I've had time to think about it, and it's there. I don't think they're going to let the Ministry get away with this."

Shield rattled his wings one against the other, so they sounded like war drums. Harry nodded in response to the sound as well as Ron's statement. "I sent Corners into the Ministry to spy, and Snape might do the same with some of the Ashborn." Snape had made the statement at breakfast that morning, neutral-voiced, and said nothing else. "But, Ron…there's the chance that Percy might have told them something about how I fight. That's what Corners hinted at last night, when he came back from his spying."

Ron closed his eyes. "Of course he would," he muttered. "And of course he would see nothing wrong with it, because why would he? It's just information he can give the Ministry to make himself more _important_. It's just _news _that they could find out some other way. That was the justification he always gave for telling Mum when I did something dangerous."

"Uh, Ron, you don't have to do anything about it," Harry said, because he thought Ron wouldn't need a Pepper-Up Potion to make steam come out of his ears right now. "Forget I said anything, if you want. I'm sure Shield and Draco and Snape will help me punish him."

"Forget about it?" Ron's eyes snapped open again. "When he's my bloody _brother_?"

"But I don't think he meant to betray me," Harry started again. Goddamn it, this was exactly what he had wanted to avoid, getting Ron involved and feeling like he had to turn against his family for Harry. Harry had broken enough things and people and relationships in his life so far. He wanted to build, now, and ignore those things that would tear him down in return. _Stupid bloody Ministry, getting me involved in this again_.

"That doesn't matter," Ron said, shaking his head. "He still should have contacted Hermione and me after last night to ask us if we were all right. He didn't. That's a sign he's feeling guilty, and guilt always unsettles Percy. He feels it so seldom." There was a faint, hard smile on his face that Harry had last seen right before he killed one of Voldemort's guard trolls.

"Well, if you're sure," Harry said, because better to agree gracefully than to have to change things at the point of a wand.

"Yes, I am," Ron said. "Give me time to work on him. Don't make a move concerning him yet."

Harry bit his lip as he thought about that. "I can try to keep Snape and Malfoy from doing that, but I don't know how long I can," he said. "Percy is the one solid lead we have, and I think that Snape is going to be desperate to show the Ministry what he can do, or what they shouldn't have done to me."

"I'll be as quick as I can," Ron said. "No one expects _me _to launch a firecall like that, instead of Hermione." He gave Harry a smile bright as mayhem and then disappeared into the flames.

Harry leaned back on his elbows and stroked Shield again. The dragon rattled his wings one more time and closed his eyes, although his neck still twisted from side to side, and he lifted his head the instant Corners slithered under the wall.

"You went out again already?" Harry asked in surprise, holding out his hand in case Corners wanted to join him. Shield sprang onto his shoulder and locked his wings in position for gliding, hissing at Corners. Corners flickered his tongue at the dragon in response and curled up in the cup on Harry's bedside table.

"I wished to," Corners said. "The home-nest you have is fascinating." Harry rolled his eyes. He had managed to make Corners understand that the Ministry was important and central to a lot of wizards, but he hadn't managed to get him to see that it wasn't because all the wizards in Britain were hatched in that place. "Many pipes, many songs of strange waters. I heard the strangest one of all this morning."

"What did you hear?" Harry asked, wondering if the Ministry might have offered alliance to the Water People. But then, Corners would probably find that familiar, not strange, and Harry couldn't imagine the Ministry wanting to listen to the magical creatures as allies anyway.

"The song of the dead."

Harry stared. Then he sat up and nodded. "And did you find a dead—person?" It was still hard to tell how Corners would hear him when he said that. As far as Harry knew, "person" in Parseltongue meant "snake," but Corners might hear it as referring to another of the Water People.

"I found a body." Corners flicked his tongue out again, and this time Shield didn't move, staring at him. Once again, Corners turned his head away regally, as though he didn't have time to be bothered by the dragon's staring. "A wizard body. Floating in the water as though someone had dumped it there. It was bloated, and small creatures had eaten the face."

Harry leaned back on his elbows again. "Then someone must have dumped it a long time ago." His first thought was to connect the body with the fight last night, but of course, other conspiracies would happen in the Ministry all the time, and this body might have come from any one of them.

"There was also the taste of fresh magic," Corners said, in the strangely prim tone that he sometimes used to discuss wizarding spells, as though he assumed they didn't fit the proper definition of magic that _he _used. "Spells to age. Spells to call the small creatures. The magic was thick around the body."

Harry hissed, a meaningless hiss, he thought, but Shield brought his head around and Corners jerked hard enough for Harry to feel a thin film of wetness on his fingers. "Sorry," he mumbled, wondering what that meant in Parseltongue. "So—they wanted a plausible lie. If someone found the body, they would assume it couldn't come from last night, not if it had spent a long time in the water."

"I smelled the cooked places," Corners said. "As though someone had caught the body in fire."

Harry sighed and closed his eyes, massaging the bridge of his nose. Yes, of course someone would do that. The same kind of person who might decide it was a good idea to dump the body in the water in the first place. Or perhaps the fire had been accidental. The body could have come from the fight or been involved in the fight or died that way, who knew?

"Could you find the body again?" he asked, studying Corners.

Corners corkscrewed his neck into a tight bow. "Can you tell which way the wind is blowing?" he asked.

Harry nodded. "All right. And—this is the part that I know you might not want to—could you speak to other wizards about where and how you found it?"

"They could not speak to me."

"Yes, but I would translate for you." Harry didn't know how "translate" came out in Parseltongue, either, but he assumed Corners understood the concept, because he let his long eyelashes rest on his face in what looked like consideration instead of asking a question. Harry discovered he was holding his breath and made himself breathe out. Shield promptly bent down his head and studied the middle of Harry's chest, probably to make out whether Harry was having a problem with his heart or lungs. Harry poked him to make him back off and then concentrated on breathing normally for a time.

"I would do it," Corners said, opening his eyes. "But you would not translate the words you wanted me to speak. Not the words that would make them comfortable. You would translate the words I _spoke_, and you would translate all their words to me."

"Even the insulting ones?" Harry asked, trying to imagine the Wizengamot's reaction—or the reaction of what was left of the Wizengamot—to a Water Person hovering in a glass in front of them.

"I want to know the truth," Corners said. "All of it. When someone asks me for a tale about wizards, I want to tell the true ones, and if someone asks whether they should come up the river, I want to tell them if they should bother."

Harry smiled wanly. That was honest, at least. And he thought Corners had the right to make the decision for himself, and spread the warning. At least no one could ever harm the Water People in the depths of the ocean, where they could scatter themselves so widely that no one would know which particles of water belonged to them and which did not.

"So I will find the body," Corners said. "And then what will you do? What will you do if someone else finds it and takes it away?"

Harry hesitated. Then he said, "Could you take someone else with you? If they could change into water themselves, or swim well with a charm on that would let them breathe underwater?"

"They would not believe you," Corners said quickly. Harry grinned more strongly this time. Corners probably imagined how awkward it would be to have to herd a human through the pipes, and Harry couldn't disagree with him. "It would be better if I went on my own, and made sure the body was not moved."

Harry looked up at Shield. "Could you take him with you? I know he's a creature of fire, but he should be able to swim, and he doesn't need to breathe in the way that a normal dragon would."

Corners flicked out his tongue again, and this time, Harry was sure that he could see contempt in the way it curled, although he didn't know how he could accurately distinguish a serpent's emotions like that. "I would rather take you swimming with a charm," Corners said at last. "He is a creature of fire, yes. While he does not breathe, he was not made for _this_."

Harry decided from the tone of the refusal that it was probably better if he gave up asking Corners about Shield going with him. "All right," he said. "Then I need to speak with the others, and we can decide what to do together."

"You do that." Corners pulled his head back and dissolved into shapeless water in his glass, leaving Shield to make a soft chirring noise. Harry didn't know what it meant, but Shield clung to him with his wings fluttering slowly for a long time before Harry could convince him to let go. And he might as well not have convinced him, since Shield followed him down the corridor towards Snape's rooms when Harry opened his door. Harry rolled his eyes.

_I'm surrounded by a multitude of protective snakes. Honestly._

But that thought at least made a good distraction from the thoughts that came over him as he stood outside Snape's door. There was a sharp breath caught in the middle of his chest, and he couldn't help remembering this was the first time he'd seen Snape in the flesh since they made the second set of Vows—

_Unless you count him trying to save your life when you showed up burned from the Ministry attack, or at breakfast this morning._

But Harry didn't count that, since the one was such a brief moment and Snape hadn't spoken much at breakfast, and he couldn't keep his hand from knocking twice at the door, instead of the single firm, confident time that he had planned on. Snape spoke his name, and Harry nodded and waited outside the door, not wanting to open it in case he startled defensive wards.

_I can do this. Of course I can. It's not such a big deal._

* * *

"Harry. Come in."

Severus stepped back, and told himself that to feel like a nervous host was to play the idiot. Of course Harry would come to seek him so that they could speak about the best way of action with regards to the Ministry. Of course Harry would resent that Severus might use the Ashborn against their will—if they could be said to have a will—and would want to complain.

There was no reason for him to feel that he was carrying a large glass globe in his hands, one that might shatter with a single fall.

Severus retreated to the far side of the room, and watched as Harry looked around. Severus had spent more than a year in these quarters already, and wondered how they would look to a stranger, which definition did not encompass him, Draco, or any of the Ashborn. The walls were plain dark stone, as the rest of the fortress was, but one could hardly see them for the bookshelves that stood against them, and the tapestry that depicted the slaughter of a unicorn by Muggle hunters. Severus had always rather valued that scene. Beauty and innocence brought to bay by the more powerful, and taught as a lesson in a series of compressed pictures.

Harry's eyes lingered on the tapestries, especially the one that showed the unicorn kicking out against a hunter while goring a hound, but he turned back to Severus without saying a word about it. "I need to talk to you about what Corners found when he went spying in the Ministry," he said. "Do you want to get Draco, or should we talk about this alone?"

"Alone," Severus said, and regretted the snap in his voice when Harry stared at him. But he could not deny the way his insides clenched when he thought of the long conversation Draco and Harry had had, by themselves, yesterday, while he sat brooding over the list of names. Draco had mentioned it at dinner, casually. Severus had looked the other way and eaten more beans while he thought about it.

"All right," Harry said, and glanced around as though wondering which of the tall, black wood chairs he should take. Severus gestured at the nearest, and cast a Cushioning Charm on it. Harry paused to grin at him. "You don't have to do that. They didn't burn my arse."

"Give me—permission to do it," Severus said, his voice strangled, though he couldn't have said that whether that came from Harry's playful tone, or the invocation of his arse, or something else. "I would like to—aid you."

_Oh, yes, Severus, wonderful words, stiff as they are, when Draco would have said something more charming. That is the kind of gift that comes from being Lucius Malfoy's son, while you are the son of an abusive Muggle._

On the other hand, Harry might understand that, given his own childhood and the glimpses he had picked up of Tobias during their Occlumency sessions in fifth year. Harry at least looked at him thoughtfully instead of laughing, and then nodded. "Thank you," he said.

Severus nodded back, and took the chair opposite him, and stirred the fire so that it threw light throughout the room. The colors in the tapestries caught it and gleamed richly. He suppressed the impulse to try to impress Harry with the age of his books and the finely-made cauldron in the corner; Harry didn't know enough about such subjects to _be _impressed.

They stared at each other in silence.

Severus felt a sharp prickling steal over his body as Harry looked at him. Who could know what Harry saw? He might value Draco's open, polished beauty, gleaming like steel, far more than he would something like Severus's deft fingers and Potions skill. Severus had not much idea what the real Harry Potter, as opposed to his cracked image of the boy, liked or valued.

_Loyalty. Compassion. The desire to help others. Freedom._

Well. Severus let out a slow breath. Perhaps he would not be good at exercising those virtues that Harry valued, but the fact that he could name them to himself when he wanted was at least a good sign that he knew something about Harry.

"Corners found a body floating in the water, somewhere in the Ministry," Harry said abruptly. "He thinks that it has something to do with the confrontation last night, because there were spells on it to make it look as if it had been in the water longer than it really had. And he says that Percy Weasley might have told someone something about me. My fighting skills, maybe." He watched Severus with a lowered head that seemed to wait for an explosion.

Severus narrowed his eyes. "I am not pleased that that happened, but I will not harm him if you do not wish me to," he said.

Harry blinked, then smiled faintly. "Thank you, sir."

"Can you use my first name yet?" Severus asked. "I have seen you do it for Draco, but you seem to avoid mine."

Harry squared his shoulders. "And you would rather talk about that than about what Corners found?" he asked, as if testing.

"Yes," Severus said. "I think we must. We will speak in full conference with Draco about the body and Percy Weasley later, but this—why do you smile?" he added, because Harry _was _grinning, and not doing much to hide it.

"Because you speak so formally, even when no one's around to hear you," Harry said, and then paused. "It reminds me of the old days at Hogwarts," he said. "I don't want to think about them, but I always do when I'm around you and Draco."

"Can you be in a sexual relationship with us?" Severus asked. He could feel the universal gasp in his head, the voices of all the Slytherins who had ever trained with him or helped him or advised him. To speak in such a way, so bluntly and directly, about a private matter, was worse than Gryffindor; it was vulgar. But Severus saw no other way to approach the matter, since Harry seemed to have developed the art of dancing aside from the subject no matter how Severus spoke of it.

Sure enough, Harry choked on air, and then sat staring at Severus in incredulity that was less than flattering. But before Severus could regret speaking as he had, Harry sighed and stared at his hands.

"That's honest," he whispered. "The least I can do is be honest in return." He looked up. "Yes."

"You can—?" Severus prodded, because he did not believe what he had asked for himself.

"Yes, I can see myself in a sexual relationship with you and Draco," Harry said, and smiled at him.

Severus closed his eyes. He would do something, say something, if he had them open that he did not wish to do or say. He did not know what that was, but the knowledge he _did _have was enough. He remained still for long moments, his breath coming in and out of his lungs as if he were about to collapse, until the sensation went past.

"Good," he said, opening his eyes. "Then we may as well speak on the Ashborn. I could send an Ashborn with Corners to find this body, or at least spy out its position. I can extend my senses through their eyes and ears, as you have reason to know." Harry winced a little, but nodded. "Is this an acceptable compromise?"

"I wish you would free them," Harry said, sitting motionless, eyes on him. He paused, then added, "Severus."

Had it been Draco sitting in front of him, Severus would have accused him of using his first name this time simply to manipulate him. He doubted Harry would do such a thing on purpose, but he might on accident. Severus again allowed a moment to go by, and then said, "I could send Incognita. But I could not see through her eyes as I could with someone still under my control—"

"You mean someone enslaved?" Harry leaned forwards until he was hanging off the seat of the chair. "You might as well _say _the words you mean, you know."

Severus bared his teeth. "I did not consider it slavery," he said. "In many ways, I still do not. It was the only way that Draco and I survived the death of the Dark Lord. If I had not taken control of the Death Eaters, they would have slaughtered us as traitors."

"You could have used the control of their minds to make them stand back and let you by," Harry said, and from his smile, Severus could feel the pointed shape of the words that were coming. "And then let them go once you were free. Or taken control of the ones like Bellatrix that you thought would never stop hunting you. But to take all of them? That's what I don't understand."

"I wished to be absolutely safe," Severus said. "I will not defend the desire." He took care to sit with his arms at his sides, not in the defensive closed position he wanted to adopt. "But I could not be safe when someone remained free who had a grudge against me as they had reason to have a grudge."

"That time is past," Harry said quietly, insistently, and this time he looked as if he might explode out of his chair and at Severus. Severus told himself with what he hoped was equal insistence that it would not happen, but his heart sped up and he felt the dump of adrenaline into his veins. "The—_he's _dead. The Ashborn are a feared power in the world, and no one's going to attack you out of nowhere. You should let them go."

"You have enemies in the Ministry," Severus said harshly. "And when the world becomes aware that I stand at your side, I will have enemies, too. You expect me to let the Ashborn go, at the precise moment it would do me good to have a guard around me?"

"It's let them go," Harry said. "Eventually. With time, and the assurance that you can work on the binding spells on their minds to mean they have some free will and _mind _left." He paused and took a deep breath. "But yeah. Eventually, it's let them go or let me go."

Severus told himself it was no more than what he had expected. He told himself that Harry was not demanding as much as he could have, as much as he might have had he not felt an equal interest in Severus and Draco to what they felt in him. He told himself that he would do very well with Bellatrix and Greyback still under the binding and some, like Incognita, who would stay with him because they had nowhere else to go.

He told himself that, and he still felt as if someone had knocked all the walls of his fortress down.

"I said eventually," Harry said, and Severus snapped his head around to say that he knew that—and then shut his mouth. Harry's eyes were far too bright, and he saw too deep and too far. Severus had to look away again. Harry paused, and when he spoke again, at least he didn't use his words as he could have, to open Severus up and flay him. "I know this is hard for you. But it will be harder for the people who lived without their free will for months, maybe years, and now have it back again. That's what tempers my compassion and keeps me from feeling as sorry for you as I could have."

Severus snorted weakly. "Are you sorry for me?" he murmured. "You do not show it."

"I feel sorry for anyone who has to enslave other people to make themselves feel better," said Harry. "I even felt some pity for Voldemort before the end. Not enough not to kill him, and I think that my pity had faded completely by the time we came into our final conflict. But it was there."

Severus had to look then, and he despised the look in Harry's eyes as he never had before. "I did not bind them to make myself _feel better,_" he said, coating the words with the contempt that he felt they deserved. "I told you why I did it." He was tempted to repeat the true explanations, but if he had done it once and Harry hadn't been convinced by them, there was no reason to say them again.

Harry shrugged and leaned back. "All right. Sooner or later, motivation stops mattering, and what matters is the result."

"How _Slytherin_ of you," Severus sneered, and caught his tongue between his teeth. Those words might make Harry draw back, and then he and Draco would have all the work to do over again, if they wanted to keep him. It was a problem Severus had had all his life: letting the immediate impulse destroy the long-term gain.

Harry only smiled. "Yes, all right, you can say that. But in this case, you're the one who has to act like a Gryffindor. Face the fact that you've done something wrong, and apologize. In this case, by freeing them."

"That is Gryffindor?" Severus arched an eyebrow. "I certainly recall a number of them who would not apologize for what they had done even if someone rubbed their noses in their crimes."

Harry nodded. "I was like that, too. I'm sorry." Severus opened his mouth to ask how Harry knew Severus had not been speaking of _him_, but Harry continued, his calm almost majestic. "And I know I'm asking a lot. That's why I want to give you time. And there are some Ashborn that can never be released, like Bellatrix probably."

"And Greyback," Severus said, at his most dry. "Unless you know some miraculous method to control a werewolf who preys on children."

Harry shook his head. "All right. You can make a list of the ones that you don't think you can control or that would go insane without the Mark, and then we can discuss it."

"You talk of giving nothing up, I notice," Severus said.

"A few things, yes," Harry said calmly. "Like privacy from my friends' constant questions for a few months. Even if Ron and Hermione have accepted you, the rest of the Weasleys won't make it so easy. But I'll be the one they yell at, since they know yelling at you and Draco wouldn't do any good."

"A miracle I managed to teach them _that _much," Severus muttered, thinking of the endless procession of red-heads through his classroom.

"But mostly, I don't think of this as a sacrifice," Harry said. "I think of this as something I want to do." He reached out, and his fingers slid over Severus's palm uncertainly for a moment before clasping and holding tight. "You can think of it the same way, if you want. Or as a price. A price paid to gain something greater."

That, Severus was familiar with. And he had once thought that he was done paying such prices once he set up the Ashborn, that he had the people surrounding him he would live with and who would shelter and guard him and give him the experience of being a Lord to the end of his days.

He ought to have known it would not be that simple from the first moment he demanded Harry Potter as a hostage.

He sighed and spent a moment thinking. Harry waited, hand still extended, body still. Severus turned his hand over and closed his fingers so that he could feel Harry's fingers and palm, wondering as he did so if this was what he wanted.

And he felt it, and he made his decision.

"You and I will need to go over the list _carefully_," he said. "I will not take the risk of missing someone who must remain under control and risking a stampede through my lab, or one that would put Draco's life, and yours, at risk. And I can only do them one at a time. Releasing the bindings on Incognita took a great deal of my strength and gave me a headache." He paused, then added, "And I want to wait until I can send one of them through the water beside your snake. An accurate report through their eyes and ears is the only way I can be certain of the evidence."

"But then?" Harry breathed, as delicately as if his breath would make a spiderweb tremble.

"Then," Severus said, "it will happen. As you ask for."

Harry's smile was like the morning.

* * *

"Can I come with you when you and Thera visit Laughter?"

Draco started and turned around. He had just left the centaurs' garden, after making the final preparations with Thera for how she would accompany him tonight. He hadn't expected Harry to be lurking against a wall.

Draco waited a moment, both to make sure he would speak the right words and to soothe the jealousy he had felt that afternoon as he watched Harry go into Severus's quarters. What had they talked about, all their long, private meeting alone?

_Perhaps something of the same level of intimacy that you and Harry talked about?_

The thought made him lay down his hackles, and he nodded to Harry, though not a nod of agreement. "Why would you want to?" he asked. "You told me often enough that you cared nothing for the alliance, and you broke your promise to the centaurs."

"I—I'm interested in it now," Harry said, taking a step forwards.

"Why?" Draco repeated, and folded his arms. "I'll bring you if you really want to come, but it'll take a while to remember how to dream to include a third person, instead of just two. Two was hard enough. I'm not going to do it for some whim of yours."

Harry spent a moment scratching his forehead under the fringe. Draco's eyes followed his fingers irresistibly, but he couldn't make out the old scar.

"Because it concerns you," Harry said at last, and the way he flushed and turned his face away told Draco that he hadn't been searching for an answer, the way Draco had assumed. Instead, he'd been searching for an acceptable way to phrase it. "If—if you want me to come, I'd like to. If it isn't too much trouble."

Draco took a moment to appreciate the mad wildness of his life. Three years ago, he never could have imagined Harry Potter asking permission to accompany him and a centaur on a dream-journey to the leader of the werewolves.

Then again, three years ago he would have thought he wasn't smart or competent enough to attempt something like this, and centaurs and werewolves would have been "just" magical creatures to him.

_And Harry Potter just a Gryffindor._

"I want you to think about it more," he said, before he could spoil the moment with too much consideration. Harry blinked at him, and then narrowed his eyes.

"Are you saying that because you think my interest isn't sincere?" he asked, his voice so low that Draco had to tilt his head to hear him. "I promise you, Draco, it _is_. There's no way that—that I can make up for what I did by leaving the centaurs, maybe, but I do care about the alliance because you care about it."

"Yes, but right now, you would unbalance this fragile respect I have from Laughter," Draco said, and he knew the words were true as he spoke them, but he still couldn't believe that he was saying them. He should have jumped at the chance to have Harry by his side. All his political instincts said so, and it _seemed _true the longer he thought about it. Why wouldn't it be true?

But at the same time, he had a new set of instincts, the ones derived from the moments he'd actually spent in Laughter's company, and convincing Thera. And of course, there was another reason.

"I don't know if Thera would want to come with me if she knew that you were going, either," he added.

Harry blinked, then smiled faintly. "I reckon I have to make a few more sacrifices than I thought I would, after all," he muttered.

"This isn't a sacrifice I'm _demanding _of you," Draco said. "I'm asking you."

"The way I asked you if I could go." Harry didn't make it a question, though Draco thought it might have started out as one. He nodded, and then said, "That makes sense, Draco. I'll see you later." He turned and left.

Draco leaned against the wall, and tried to work out the clashing, changing, challenging emotions in himself.

In the end, he had to give it up as a bad job. He would understand better later; right now, he had a political meeting to prepare for.


	30. The Ministry by Storm

Thank you again for all the reviews!

_Chapter Thirty—The Ministry by Storm_

"I do not like this."

Harry winced at the way Corners's hiss echoed in his mind. Come to that, he wasn't fond himself of being in the presence of one of Snape's—fine, Severus's—blankly staring Ashborn. He was a tall man called Ignatius Yaxley who had never been among the Death Eaters Harry and his friends had fought. According to Snape, he had spent most of his time during the war filing reports and paperwork on the movements of Ministry Aurors. That made this a little better in some ways, worse in others. Part of Harry might have taken some satisfaction in seeing someone he hated chained like that.

Not a part that he liked to think existed, but a part he knew was there, and had made his peace with. Somewhat.

"Did you hear me?" Corners brought him back to the present, darting his tongue out to splash against Harry's eyebrow. "I don't want to work with him!"

Harry smiled at Corners and reached up to place one hand on the side of his neck, or at least do something that was as near as he could come without breaking the surface tension. "I hate to ask this," he said. "But will you do it, for me? Go along with him, and let him swim with you. He'll have all the magic he needs to do that."

"Wizard magic can't make someone who will keep up with me." Corners turned his head away, and his tongue flickered out again, tapping against the far wall this time, and leaving strings of wetness that slid down towards the bed.

"I know, I know," Harry soothed him. "And I realize that I'm asking you for a lot, because I'm asking you to put up with this. But Snape's magic really is the best there is for keeping someone like this committed to swimming and nothing else. No wizard can keep up with you, but this one won't trail as far behind as some others."

He tasted bile in his throat as he thought about that, but swallowed it down again. Yes, he could insist that all of Snape's Ashborn be freed now, and that would accomplish exactly nothing except to make him feel confirmed in his own righteousness. Snape wouldn't do it, and Harry would lose the fragile influence over him that might persuade Snape to act in that way just because Harry wanted him to.

He would do what would get the Ashborn freed. And if that meant compromising himself in the short run…well, it wasn't as though he hadn't already done things that were the equivalent of that.

"You promise?" Corners asked. "He will swim with me and not whine about it when I outpace him?"

"As long as you remain near enough that he can see you," Harry promised, "then he'll have nothing to whine about, I promise you."

"It is tempting to leave him behind," Corners said, and his tongue lashed and danced in the confines of his jaws.

"I know," Harry said. "I can only ask you not to, and I might not ever know, if his report isn't good enough."

Corners snapped and clashed his jaws again, although being what he was, it simply felt like having a dash of cold water slung in his face to Harry. Then he bowed his head, and the ripples of resignation ran through his neck as he said, "Very well. But you will not blame me when this fails, as it will."

"Of course not," Harry said, although he wondered why Corners thought it doomed to failure. Well, if it did, then Harry was the one who would take up the task of explaining to Snape, both out of duty and out of necessity. "Can you take the stream out of here, so that he has a place to swim when he enters the pipes?"

"Elaborate plans will not be necessary, Harry."

Harry jumped. He'd heard Snape's voice emerge from the lips of an Ashborn before, but it still startled him no matter how times he heard it. He turned around and nodded, since he didn't know what other gesture would be appropriate. "Fine. What plan do you have?"

"Yaxley will Apparate to the Ministry," said Snape, his voice so calm and controlled Harry wondered whether he _ever _had a reaction to anyone else except in private. Of course, that would be a natural restriction for a man who would have had to worry about what his emotions revealed, for years, to everyone but a small and special cadre of people. "Corners will reach it by whatever means he deems necessary. I will have Yaxley waiting by the entrance of the pipe that we agreed upon with a Shrinking Charm."

"So he can keep up," Harry said, and then turned back and repeated the news to Corners in Parseltongue.

"If he is small, he will have a longer distance to swim," Corners said, with as much flatness as a snake in small, constant motion was capable of. "That is not a gain, not to me."

Harry repeated the objection to Snape, wishing for a moment that Snape knew Parseltongue so they could argue with each other. As it was, he could practically feel Snape pausing somewhere behind the medium of Yaxley's eyes and lips and tongue, calming himself so that he wouldn't snap at Harry as the bearer of bad news.

"If he has the right spells, then he will swim no slower than a small fish," Snape said, "And some of them are quite speedy."

When that was repeated, Corners tilted his head as if thinking about memories of the ocean Harry wouldn't recognize, and then said, "Very well. I agree, as long as he has the right magic." His tongue flicked out again, and he added, "At least _someone _recognizes the necessity for spells that are more than ones that ensure they breathe underwater."

That made Harry pause and wonder whether Corners had encountered other wizards before this, out in the middle of the ocean, just idiots who didn't know the proper spells to communicate with one of the Water People and didn't know what to do when they found one. But now was not the right time to ask. He stepped back and nodded to Yaxley. "Then I wish you good luck and good hunting," he said.

"In English, Harry," Snape—Severus—murmured.

Harry flushed and repeated the blessing, and Yaxley bowed to him, which was something else Harry would have to talk to Severus about. He didn't want the Ashborn bowing and scraping to him. It was something that would probably remain in their minds when they awoke to free will in the future—if they could remember anything about their lives in captivity, which Harry had to admit was a big assumption—and Harry wanted to spit when he thought about that.

Then again, there were more important matters to address as well.

He turned away and sat down on his bed as Corners slithered under the wall and Yaxley Apparated. As he did so, he wondered, a little wistfully, what Draco was doing at the moment. Tonight was the evening that he was supposed to dream himself into the Forbidden Forest with Thera and meet Laughter.

_ I would have liked to go._

Harry understood the reasons Draco had refused him, and was inclined to agree that he needed his independence. But that didn't still his wondering.

Eventually, he went to the library and started reading about the history of the pure-blood alliance, so that his leaping, nervous mind would at least be good for something. He thought about reciting that history to Draco when he came back—whole, of course, since he wasn't going to consider what would happen if Draco got injured in the dream—and then firmly put it out of his head.

He was learning to do that quite well.

* * *

"Laughter, this is Thera."

Draco felt silly even as he made the introductions, because of _course _it was Thera, what other centaur would he haul with him into the middle of the Forbidden Forest? Likewise, Thera must know the leader of the Forbidden Forest werewolves through hearing Draco talk about him without Draco mentioning the name.

But Laughter still smiled at him as if he had done something praiseworthy and rose to his haunches to extend one paw-like hand to Thera. "I like your name," he said. "It reminds me of wild things and the scent of the rose."

Thera paused, and then moved closer to him, her hooves scraping and her haunches braced for what Draco thought would be a spring away if she had her way. Despite everything, she was remembering that Laughter was dangerous to a four-legged magical creature like herself in ways, Draco reckoned, that he wasn't dangerous to a human. "I didn't know that werewolves liked such sounds," she said. "Or such scents."

"You thought we reveled in the scent of blood and killing, the sounds of the chase, and nothing else?" Laughter's voice was gentle, but Draco watched the way his feet, still buried in the grass, flexed, and suspected it would not remain so for long.

Draco opened his mouth to say something, worried about this meeting going wrong before it could properly begin, but Thera nodded, and her face was so sober that Draco paused, and sat back for a moment, and waited for her to speak.

"Yes," she said. "That is what we think of werewolves, and I think, at times, that you cannot deny there may be reasons for us to think so." Her eyes were bright with—honesty, Draco thought, not a challenge. He wasn't sure Laughter would recognize the distinction, though.

He seemed to, or perhaps he could smell something in her scent that was invisible to Draco. Laughter leaned back in the grass, at least, and flicked his hand that had touched Thera's as though he was brushing away a flea. "You are a strange diplomat," he said. "But if the centaurs sent you, they must know what they are doing."

Thera smiled, a wild, strange, fey look to her face that Draco never remembered seeing before. "Sometimes my people gamble," she said. "We are surrounded quite as much by starlight as you are by blood, and the starlight sometimes rules us."

Laughter inclined his head and lay down, belly-length, in the grass. "I like the way you negotiate, centaur. Shall we begin?"

Thera lay down, too, her legs folded beneath her like a horse resting and her hands lying on her front pair of knees. Draco felt more than a little awkward as he sat beside them, but it was to him that Laughter turned first.

"Harry Potter has returned to the alliance, I have heard reports," he said.

Draco carefully concealed his irritation, though from Laughter's spiking smile, he was sure the werewolf smelled it in his scent. "Yes," he said. "But I elected not to let him come tonight. I thought it would unbalance the meeting, and it would certainly have unbalanced the dream technique that we came up with get Thera here." He'd had to enter Thera's mind with Legilimency and leave perceptions of his meetings with Laughter with her to ensure that she got the clearing exactly right.

"Quite right," Laughter said. "He is a factor—a powerful factor—that we should deal with, but not now." He paused, and if he had had a tail, Draco was sure he would have flicked it. "What is the matter? You look quite stunned."

"I—nothing," Draco said, and shook his head in some shock. "Well, I am surprised that you don't want him here from the very beginning."

"Because you are used to people who value him instead of you," Laughter said, with all the self-assurance that didn't make it a question. "But you are the one who has brought our negotiations this far, and that is remarkable for someone who has never done this before."

"I—part of that is because you like me," Draco said. "I mean, as a person."

"And whose skill is that, that we like you instead of despise you?" Laughter's smile showed a frightening amount of teeth. "Now, we will begin to discuss the boundaries of our territories, since that is likely to be the most contentious issue." He bobbed his head in Thera's direction. "Contribute something when you have it to contribute, Mr. Malfoy."

Thera smiled back at Laughter. _Her _teeth were flat and horse-like in the front, but it competed well with Laughter's smile anyway.

Draco swallowed, and folded his shaking hands in his lap. He hoped his scent didn't give him away too much.

_This might be fun._

* * *

"That's _not _what I told you to do."

Severus paused and turned in the direction of Harry's door again. He'd gone there intending to talk to him when Harry didn't come to dinner, but had heard no sounds behind the door, and concluded that he must be sleeping. Now, it sounded as if he was talking to someone in a low, agitated tone, but in English? Perhaps it was to Shield. Severus had noted that Harry did not always get along with Draco's conception of what a guardian dragon should do.

He knocked, and the soft rustling sounds behind the door and Harry's voice ceased at once. Then Harry seemed to remember that he was in the middle of a (relatively) secure fortress and not being hunted in the woods by the Dark Lord, and called out gamely, "Who's there?" _The worst it can be is an Ashborn, _Severus could feel him mentally adding.

"Severus," Severus said, and waited. There was still a long hesitation before Harry undid the bolt, but all things considered, he could not blame the boy.

Man. That was sometimes as hard for him to keep in mind as his first name appeared to be for Harry.

Harry appeared to fill the slight crack that the door had opened to show, and gave Severus rather a sickly smile. "Severus. Um. There may be a slight problem here, especially given what Shield—_hold!_" He snapped the command over his shoulder with such authority that Severus found his own muscles locking. Then Harry turned around, saw him, and coughed. "Um. Corners and Yaxley found someone near the body when they arrived."

"I saw nothing of this," Severus said in a low voice. Actually, he had lost contact with Yaxley almost as soon as the man passed into the Ministry, no doubt the effect of wards against Legilimency established at the height of the Dark Lord's power. He had anticipated that, but sending the man anyway was important, to show Harry that he need not act alone.

"I _know_," Harry said, and sighed. "That's the problem. Corners—did something when they captured this man. Something that blocked Yaxley from telling anyone else about it. And then they brought him here, because Corners thought I should be the first one to know about him, and Shield won't stop attacking him."

Severus stood still for a moment, thinking about that, and then nodded. "I think you should let me come in," he said.

Harry eyed him as if wondering whether he would try to harm Corners or Shield for this, and then nodded, sighed, and moved away. Severus glided into the room and turned around, lifting his wand for protection against the water snake attack he thought would be coming.

Corners, however, curled in a cup on the floor, merely watched him. Yaxley stood off to the side like a living statue, staring at the wall and now and then blinking as though he needed to work his eye muscles. Shield hovered, his wings clanging as they flapped, over a man stretched full-length on the bed. Ropes surrounded him, binding arms to sides and ankles to waist. Severus would not have used the same binding spells himself, but then, these were effective at keeping the man from moving or reaching his wand.

He had dark eyes and dark hair, and he stared at both of them with an endless, unvarying hatred that explained Shield's hostility to him. Severus lowered his wand as he stared back. The man's face woke no familiarity—not surprising, when he had not seen a _Prophet _for several years and rarely in the months since his freedom—but the hatred was enough to convince Severus he was dangerous.

"Has he given his name?" Severus asked over his shoulder.

Harry snorted and moved forwards. "No. I was trying to reason with him and explain that if he wasn't responsible for the body being there, then we could perhaps let him go—"

Severus hid a dark smile. The man had not believed Harry, not because he thought Harry a liar but because he worked on a different level, the level himself Severus had spent his time as a spy at. Never trust the word of an enemy you hated. Either you would find a way to kill him or he would figure out that you wanted to do that and kill you. There was no way this story could have a merciful ending.

"But he won't talk," Harry said. "Won't even give his name. And it doesn't help that I have to keep restraining Shield from killing him and wonder what Corners did to Yaxley, what kind of spell he put on him." He shot a glance at the snake and hissed something in shivery Parseltongue.

Corners hissed back. Severus had long since accepted that he would never understand the words and nuances of the language, and that meant all the tones—repentance, anger, and so on—sounded alike to him, but this one, he thought, had an edge of smugness.

"Corners just says that he'll release Yaxley when it's time," Harry said, and turned around with a helpless shrug. "Sorry."

Severus snorted, and continued to study the man on the bed. No, he was not wearing a glamour, which had been Severus's first thought. And no gag covered his mouth, but still he would not speak. He was either a wizard of rare control or someone who knew—or thought he knew—that to speak would do him no good. His jaw firmed as Severus stared at him, and he closed his eyes as if praying for patience. Severus wished him good luck at it. If they had driven him to this state already, he might crack soon.

"Did he impress you as someone good at Occlumency?" Severus asked Harry. "If not, then I can enter his mind and decipher what he is so anxious to hide."

The man's eyes flared open, and for a moment, his hands shook inside the ropes. Then they tightened against them instead, and there was a bitter defiance, shining from the center of his soul. He knew Severus could discover his secrets, then, and did not want them discovered. Severus gave him a slow, delighted smile, and waited.

"I—we can't do that!" Harry said, sounding shocked. "He might be anyone, he might be _innocent_, why would you want to do something like that—"

"Because if he was an innocent, he would have told you his name by now," Severus said quietly. "Me? The Ashborn? Draco? He might despise. But you, he has no reason to suspect, unless he is part of the Ministry group that believed you dangerous and 'rogue' enough to destroy."

Harry's eyes opened and closed helplessly. Then he said, "If you're sure. If you think that there's no possible way he could be innocent."

"No," Severus said, drawing his wand and stepping closer to the bed. "No way at all."

The man ground his teeth for a moment, moving his jaw back and forth, and then said, "You'll be idiots if you do this." His voice was thick.

"Why?" Severus asked. He kept his voice gentle and idle, and his wand continually moving in small circles, movements to draw the eye. Of course, Legilimency was a matter of talent and training and will, not the incantation and gestures alone. Perhaps the man did not know that, from the way he stared at Snape's wand. Another useful clue to his background; here was a Ministry employee who knew little more of Legilimency and Occlumency than the names.

"Because," the man said, "you'll be isolating yourself from allies. Everyone knows that Potter can kill Dark Lords, but he can't make the wizarding world peaceful or reunited. You don't—you don't know what you're getting into. You have no _idea_."

"I think," Severus said, and he gave the man another small smile, "that you mistake Mr. Potter's desire to rule. As for me, I desire to rule only your thoughts for these next few moments. _Legilimens._"

The passage into someone else's mind was always a hectic affair, even when, like Harry a short time ago, they were not actively resisting. This man fought. Severus felt the tearing wisps of barriers, the frantic squirming and doubling back as he tried to conceal thoughts that Severus truly had no interest in isolating, and the screaming panic that lurched out of a cave in his heart and tried to bite.

The beast fell behind him as Severus dived, and found himself deep in a quiet black ocean never touched by the light of stars. He surfaced and looked about him in some interest. It was a time—a short time, perhaps, but then, he could not count the exact length of the days he had spent buried in his lab—since he had found someone whose inner world come across as water.

Here and there were islands, stony and green and small and sandy. Severus picked one of the stony ones and reached out, and yes, he caught a glimpse of Harry's face and the murmur of names before something misty and fragile tried to pluck the memory away. Severus pressed closer, and sent his mind breaking into it as if he had put his head into a Pensieve.

He found himself looking through the eyes of the man he was reading at a small group of men and women clad in grey. Unspeakables, or those who wished to look like them. One of them laid a small folder on the desk before Severus's victim and looked at him meaningfully.

"We cannot have him remain alive for long, Leopold. Yes, he served his purpose. But he seems to think that he can exist outside the Ministry and maintain connections, including Unbreakable Vows, with Death Eaters. That cannot be allowed to continue."

"I quite see that, madam," said Leopold politely, taking the folder. "You wish me to cover the tracks of the failed attempt first? Or find Potter and ask to speak with him in private first?"

"We think we know where Potter is," said the woman who had put the folder on the desk. Severus memorized her: the sleek jowls, the sleek black hair that framed them, the blue eyes that had the color of a water sapphire. "Clean up the results of the attempt first, and then send an owl asking to speak with him. Tell him…tell him that you are someone who has charge of the orphans from the war. That will do nicely."

Severus heard himself hissing like a kettle, which nearly jerked him out of the memory. He shook his head at himself and resumed his listening. He was here to listen, not awaken himself from the Legilimency trance. It would do no one any good if he missed out on vital information because he was angry.

But yes, an owl asking about war orphans would have pulled Harry to an isolated spot. Perhaps he would have taken Shield with him, but the Ministry knew about the dragon now, and might have known how to counter him.

Leopold widened his eyes, but nodded. "And how important is it that no one trace the blame back to us, madam?"

The woman paused, her hard eyes staring at the far wall above Leopold's head. The man sat still, but Severus could feel his shoulders hunching, his hands closing on the edges of the desk. He was afraid that she would ask for something impossible, something he had no clue how to provide.

"It is important," the woman said. "You know what the good of the Ministry _means _to the Ministry, and the future of the wizarding world." She looked back at Leopold, and Severus could feel the tug of other memories, ones that he would investigate in a moment. The man swallowed-Severus could feel the bob of his throat-and slowly inclined his head, until he was staring downwards at his own desk.

"I understand, madam."

"See that you do," the woman said, and she and the people with her swept out of the room. That left Leopold to turn the folder over with wondering, shaking hands.

The other memories beckoned. Severus stepped into them and found out that the woman's name was Henrietta Carson, that she was a full Unspeakable, and that she had given Leopold orders before. She found few people in the Ministry who were sufficiently loyal to its purposes, she had taught him, and therefore she had to rely on the skills of those who were. Leopold was proud and uneasy at being employed on those missions, in equal measure.

Severus pulled back with a small, hard smile. He recognized Carson's name from the list of possible enemies given to him yesterday. And now that they had Leopold captured and helpless, they could read his other memories at will. Severus would give him a chance to think about the possible advantages of cooperating.

He opened his eyes, _his _eyes, and spent a moment touching the edge of Leopold's face. The man stared up at him with what looked like the same emotions he had used when confronting Carson, and shivered. Severus nodded back at him and turned to Harry.

"He was to be the bait in a trap, luring you out on your own," he said. "To tell you that he was in charge of making arrangements for war orphans, and would like your help."

It was wonderful to watch the way Harry's lips thinned and he stared at the man on the bed as if he hated making eye contact with him. "I see," Harry murmured, clipped. "And he intended to kill me once he had me there?"

Severus nodded. "In some way that would make it impossible to trace the ambush back to the Ministry. The instigator in this particular case seems to be an Unspeakable named Henrietta Carson, though what she would have against you specifically..." He broke off, seeing the way that shutters appeared to have dropped behind Harry's eyes. "You recognize the name?"

Harry bobbed his head, once. "She approached me shortly after the end of the war and asked me to help the Ministry rebuild the wizarding world. I didn't think much about it because I just wanted to _rest_, and then a few days later I got your-statement of your intentions. I can't believe-I mean, obviously she did decide that she wanted to kill me, but I don't know why refusing one request made me a target."

"You're a traitor."

The words came from the man on the bed. Harry glared at him, but it was Severus's slow turn around and equally slow stare that made the man flush and close his eyes, as if he hated the thought that Severus had seen his memories. Tears trickled from the corners of his eyes, squeezed out by the pressure, and the slowly-deepening red color to his face could have been dangerous. Severus cast a few spells to ensure that he would not expire on them before they could learn all he knew.

"What am I a traitor to?" Harry asked quietly. "The Ministry, which I've never acknowledged as having a right to rule my actions? A group of Unspeakables who wanted to rebuild, and could have found someone else to ask? The people who all wanted me to stay a hostage with the Ashborn and not come back?"

Leopold shivered, but answered. Severus was impressed despite himself. Harry's voice had been enough to chill braver man than he suspected Leopold was. "The Ministry. The Ministry t-takes charge of the wizarding world because you can't trust individuals to do it. And they asked you to help, and you refused. What can you be but a traitor and a rebel, someone who thinks you have a greater right to rule the wizarding world than they do?"

Harry's nostrils flared, his lips clamped shut, and he made a hasty motion with one hand as if he would reach out and strangle Leopold. Severus stayed still, but Shield reared up on Harry's shoulder, his wings rattling, and curved his neck forwards, overhanging the bed like a noose.

"Right," Harry said softly, and he moved back, reaching up with one shoulder to block Shield's possible advance. Shield's claws rested on his skin, and he crooned at Harry and lowered his head to rest his snout against the skin above Harry's ear. Harry smiled faintly and shook his head, answering the silent question, Severus knew, about whether the dragon could attack. Caressing the silvery neck, he looked at Severus. "You're sure that we can hold him here and prevent him from getting a message out to anyone from the Ministry?"

"Surround him with a guard of Ashborn, and that will not happen," Severus promised.

"Good," Harry said, and his eyes were distant and bright. "I find myself disinclined to listen to the Ministry's threats and explanations for much longer. I don't care if they confine themselves to other parts of the wizarding world, because I'm too _tired _to care. I don't have the emotional depths I used to. I don't have the ability to love random people enough to sacrifice my life for them. Voldemort took it all, and it's gone. Oh, sorry," he added, absently, as Severus flinched from the name before he could stop himself.

Severus shook his head and started to answer, but Leopold gave a harsh laugh and interrupted before he could. "You say that you don't have the capacity to care about anyone else, but you _care _that a Death Eater cannot face the name of his master? You are lying, and as selfish as Carson ever said."

Harry just stared at the man until he squirmed again, and Shield rose up on his hind legs, showing claws and teeth and even the sharp edges of scales that Severus had not realized could become weapons. Then Harry made a clenched fist with one hand, and Shield settled back down, though with a sharp hiss that told Severus how frustrated he was. Well, he could empathize with the dragon. He would have liked a little permission from Harry to attack himself.

But, properly speaking, Leopold was Harry's enemy, and Severus had no objections to waiting when they might get useful information from the man later. So he stood with his arms folded, and Harry let his breath out and said, "I can't love _random people _enough anymore, I said. You should listen better. I still care for my friends and family and-and loved ones." He turned to Severus, and his eyes burned like feverish stars, perhaps because that was the first time he had admitted it in front of anyone who wasn't a Weasley.

Severus could have wished for better circumstances for this to occur in, but Harry had his respect for that, now and always. He waited, and in a moment, Harry said, "What I want to do is convince them to _leave me alone. _Me and the Weasleys and Hermione and you and Draco. Forever. What would do that?"

"Nothing," Leopold snapped from the bed. "We know our duty, and if you think that we can be turned aside from it by _fear_-"

This time, Harry let Shield leap onto the bed and poise his claws above the man's eyes. Leopold went still, and Harry gave a soft laugh that made Severus want to reach out and caress his arm, to feel the suddenly bunched muscles.

"Fear's a good tool," Harry said. "You must have hoped to use it to control me at some point, or your masters did. Perhaps they didn't think their failure at the party was such a bad one, because they knew that it might frighten me away from politics. Or whatever the fuck they thought I would _do_." He shook his head in wonder, and then turned to Severus. "We'll need Draco here for a strategy talk. And maybe the centaurs, if they want to come. And Corners. So it'll need to be later, when both Corners and Draco are rested."

"Of course," Severus murmured, gladder than he could say that Harry was going to see sense and not insist on treating Leopold and the Ministry with "gentleness," where that would have meant forgiving them and letting them get away with what they had tried to do to him. "In the meantime, I will confine Leopold."

"You won't win," Leopold snapped as Severus cast a spell that floated him upright and then reached out to Yaxley. This time, the man came to life at once, and Severus found no trace of the strange barrier that had blocked him off from contact at first. He gave a mental shrug. If Corners wanted to do such things, then he might, as long as no permanent change resulted from it. "The Ministry is stronger than you, and we have more resources and allies, and we'll resist you to the bitter end-"

"_Bilinguis_," Severus said lazily, and watched a second tongue grow from the base of Leopold's first one. The second tongue curved back into his mouth and acted as a gag, trapping the words he wanted to speak. Leopold's eyes widened and watered once more, and Severus wondered what tales the Ministry had told its employees of the horrors of Ashborn captivity, for him to look like he would die of fear.

_Or perhaps of Harry. I would be wary about going up against someone I thought of as a hero. That was why I tried to take him hostage rather than trigger an all-out war._

"Was that really necessary?" Harry asked as Yaxley marched Leopold out, but there was a dusty light in his eyes that made Severus nod without regret.

"I would persuade him of the necessity to speak to us respectfully, if he can," Severus said, moving closer to him. "And especially to you."

Harry shrugged. "It's not so much the words. It's the attitude."

"I know that," Severus said, sensing a flinch of regret in Harry that he wanted to suppress. "And it is fair for you to resent that, for you to feel that you need not put up with it, because you risked and sacrificed so much to save them."

Harry grunted. Shield flew back up to his shoulder and sat there, looping his tail around Harry's neck and crooning in his ear. Harry scratched along the length of his neck and stared at Severus. "I don't understand why they think that they have to kill me if I'm not going to cooperate," he said abruptly. "Ignoring me would have worked just as well. Or making it clear that I wasn't welcome to interfere with whatever their latest political scheme was. They didn't _need _violence."

Severus had no answer, either. But he could do one thing, and he did: leaning forwards to press his lips lightly against Harry's.

Harry blinked at him, and then he shut his eyes and opened his mouth. Severus stroked his tongue across Harry's for a moment, and touched the back of his teeth, once, and the inside of his cheek, once, and then pulled back.

Harry smiled at him. "Thanks," he said, and then moved past Severus to the door, squeezing his arm once on the way.

Severus suppressed the silly smile that wanted to break across his face, and followed.


	31. Against the Enemy

Thank you again for all the reviews!

_Chapter Thirty-One-Against the Enemies_

"I think we have achieved something here."

Draco hoped Laughter spoke the truth, rather than just the truth as he saw it. His own head was spinning, and he didn't think he could remember half the words that Laughter and Thera had spoken, or even the ones he had added. They had drifted towards a compromise, though, one that hammered out a firm border that wound through the Forest and kept the centaurs on one side and the werewolves on the other. If a member of either species got into the other's territory, they would be imprisoned but not killed while the leaders met to determine what was going on.

"I hope they will send you, or at least someone like you," Laughter told Thera, watching her with sleepy-lidded eyes as she rose to her feet. "You are the first sensible centaur I've ever spoken with."

"And you're the first werewolf who wasn't a ravening beast," Thera said sweetly, once again showing her teeth in that smile that almost shamed Laughter's.

Draco shook his head and blinked his eyes wearily, then yawned. He wondered if it counted as real sleep if he was lying in his bed dreaming all this. Perhaps not, since he was always tired after one of his negotiations with Laughter, no matter how long or short a time it took. Or perhaps it did, and the weariness was more mental than physical.

He reached out to place a hand on Thera's smooth flank and rise to his feet, but found her gone already. He frowned. He had given her perfect perceptions of the clearing; there was no reason for her to leave before he did, unless she wanted to.

"Yes. I asked her to."

Draco turned back around, his hands carefully tucked to his sides, and surveyed Laughter. He had one of those expressions on his face that could be either a smile or a snarl. Draco sank back into the grass and tried not to make any sudden moves, although he knew that, really, Laughter would smell it in his scent whether he was afraid or only wary.

"Why?" he asked. "Anything you had to say to or about the centaurs could be said to her. Better her than me, anyway."

"You still seem to think that," said Laughter lazily, whipping his hand back and forth in a complex pattern that Draco thought he would have used a tail for if he had one. "In spite of the fact that I have repeatedly tried to convince you of your own importance and diplomatic skills. Someone must have badly cracked your confidence in the past, if you will not appreciate my reassurances when I give them."

Draco didn't feel tired now. He sat up, feeling a brief vibration that was not fear pass through him. "I spent the last few years in the shadow of Severus Snape, either as a servant or as someone he had to continually defend and protect," he said. "That would harm anyone's confidence."

"I have never found Severus Snape as impressive as report painted him," said Laughter, but he continued speaking, interrupting Draco's question about when he would have _met _Severus. "And it is not only him that you seem to have these issues with. You have also mentioned yourself unfavorably in comparison to Harry Potter, and assumed we would prefer him to you. Why?"

Draco blinked and stared. Laughter stared back, and the air between them turned sharp and brittle, reminding Draco that wolves sometimes started fights by looking into each other's eyes. He turned away and muttered, "Because he's Harry Potter and both you and the centaurs asked for him, why else?"

"I asked for him in the beginning," Laughter said, and snapped his teeth on air, "because I thought he would be here, and he is a powerful person who stands a chance of unbalancing any situation he enters. The unbalancing might be to my advantage or might not, and that is something to be wary of. It does not mean, _now_, that I would reject you or prefer him as one mindless child prefers a toy simply because its sibling clings to it. You have proven you have patience, and you have proven that you can listen to me as you would another human being."

Draco opened his mouth to say that Laughter _was _another human being most of the month, and then closed it again. _Another thing I've learned is discretion._

"He might be interested in the alliance now," he said cautiously, after a moment. "Before, he said it was nothing but boredom that made him decide to speak up for the centaurs, and then he left. But now he's back, and he shows no sign of leaving again, even though he was going to spend a month away from us. Does that change things?"

"It means that we'll have to deal with him as another partner in the alliance," Laughter said, giving a fluid shrug, and rolling over again to stretch his arms above his head. "Which is not necessarily a good or a bad thing, but a neutral thing, until we see what happens." He looked at Draco upside-down, his eyes brilliantly gold in the faint moonlight that shone through the trees. "In the meantime, we have you and always will, unless you change your mind."

"I would let you know," Draco promised. "I'd have to, if only to protect my own health."

Laughter showed his teeth again, but in the expression that Draco thought was closer to a smile than most of the snarls. "And you can make jokes about us without being offensive," he said. "I find a sense of humor a valuable gift in a diplomat. I do not know that Potter has it. While you have it, and for what you have achieved so far, you are always welcome, Draco Malfoy." He rolled to his feet, inclined his head to Draco, and then turned and ambled into the bushes.

The dream began to dissolve around Draco, while he went with it, confused as he drifted on colored shreds into true sleep-confused and humbled and awed. Did that really matter? Had he accomplished something that he had only started as a dare to Severus and Harry, something to show them that he could be as good and as powerful as they were without expecting to _prove _anything?

_Perhaps I did. _

Then true sleep overcame him, and he passed on to dreams that were as pleasant, in their own way, as that realization.

* * *

Harry threw the ball against the stones and then ducked as it rebounded back at him. It barely hit the ground before he grabbed it again and hurled it at another wall of the enclosed courtyard. It was a Quaffle, but Harry had removed the Lightening Charms that usually kept it aloft more easily during Quidditch games and slightly harder to handle for airborne players, since it might bounce out of their arms. Harry wanted to toss a ball around, not fly.

He wanted the sound of the satisfying _smack _and the way he had to concentrate on where it was and what it was doing. It might drive from his mind the hatred in Leopold's eyes and the news that there was yet another enemy who wanted to kill him.

_You have to settle them. You have to make them leave you alone._

The Quaffle hit him in the face and nearly shattered his glasses. As Harry shook his head, spluttering, he saw Shield stooping at the ball like a hawk, his tail swishing furiously back and forth.

"No, leave it alone," Harry said wearily, and scrubbed at his face, wincing as his glasses pressed back against his nose. A _Reparo _took care of the damage they'd sustained, and then Harry walked over and kicked the ball. It rolled towards the wall and then back to him, indifferent to his temper. That was good. Harry needed something that was.

Shield hovered over him, and crooned. When Harry turned his head aside and edged around him to kick the Quaffle again, Shield settled on his shoulder and dug his talons in deeply enough to make Harry hiss and turn on him. Shield immediately ducked his head, coiling his neck around Harry's, and crooned again. Harry knew an apology when he heard one, and shoved at Shield to get him off his shoulder. But the dragon just clung to him.

"I don't understand," Harry whispered to him, because speaking out loud and possibly informing someone outside the pair of them of what he really felt was stupid. "I've had enemies all my life. I didn't know about Voldemort when I was a little kid, but the Dursleys were my enemies, in a way. And now I'm about to collapse and cry because one of the Unspeakables doesn't like me and tried to kill me. So what? Just because she hates me doesn't mean everyone in the Ministry does." He reached up and squeezed Shield's tail, to feel the living warmth and the way that the scales under his hand ruffled up into edged weapons. They looked so smooth at first. Harry wondered how many other surprises Draco had built into the dragon.

Shield crooned again and nuzzled close to him. His nose felt warmer than usual, more like skin and less like metal, but Harry reckoned that could be his own body heat leaking into the dragon. It didn't matter. It still felt comforting, and that was what he needed, more than kicking the Quaffle.

"I just don't understand, I think," Harry whispered, and rubbed his knuckles down Shield's spine, making Shield hiss and stretch out his neck for more. "It feels like people either ought to not care about me if they despise me, or keep attempting to use me. Not make one attempt and then decide I'm too dangerous for more."

Shield wrapped himself around Harry's shoulders and neck like a blanket made of living chains. Harry fell silent and leaned his ear against Shield's belly, listening to the thrum of magic that imitated a heartbeat.

No, he was probably never going to understand Carson and her kind. He could kill someone who was trying to kill him, he could do that just _fine_, but he couldn't decide someone was a political enemy who was better off dead and then delegate someone else to do it. His hands should be the ones stained with blood, if anybody's were going to be.

But he had people who cared for him. People who loved him. People who would surrender their own private armies for him, or who dug into their souls and produced dragons woven of it for him.

That was worth the price that it seemed he had to pay, for people who hated him for no personal reasons and would be just as happy if he had a heart attack in bed tomorrow.

"You're right," Harry told Shield, although the dragon of course hadn't said anything. Harry was glad that Draco had stopped short of a voice for him, or perhaps the spell didn't allow one. Silence was more comforting than the kind of advice anyone could offer right now, even someone as wise as Hermione. "It's better to remember what I have and seek comfort of them when I want it, rather than sitting around moping and feeling sorry for myself."

He stood up, Shield carefully flaring his wings for balance on his shoulders, and went inside, to eat and sleep and then see if Draco and Corners were awake yet.

* * *

Both Draco and Harry looked better when they were gathered again. They even had similar expressions, though Draco's was a touch more stricken with wonder, Harry's a touch more pessimistic. But they believed they could handle things, and Severus did not doubt they could, when all their strengths were allied.

Even if Harry _did _insist on taking his Ashborn away.

Severus sat down on the chair between them in his rooms and reached out with his wand to coax the fire higher. Harry blinked in the increased light and then yawned. Severus restrained the impulse to ask if he had slept well enough. They had to do something about the Ministry, and the best time was now. He did not think Harry would have risked exposing them to his planning if he didn't feel well-rested enough for it, and Shield sat on his shoulder, wings slowly opening and closing. Severus would take his cues from the dragon's distress or lack thereof.

"How is the alliance going?" Severus asked, turning towards Draco.

Draco's face rivaled the fire in the way it glowed, and Severus wondered when that had begun to happen.

_Since he crept out of your shadow and started thinking and acting on his own, _a voice snapped back at him.

The voice was probably right, which did not make Severus any more pleased to hear it. He restrained his flinch and listened to Draco talking about Laughter, and Thera, and how the werewolf leader had praised him, personally, for his part in bringing the alliance together. Severus nodded. Draco had needed praise like that, and Severus, and even Harry, did not afford him all he needed.

"But it sounds like I missed a lot of things," Draco wound his tale up, glancing back and forth between them and clasping his hands as though to hold the end of a chain between them. "That's interesting. What was it?"

Harry cleared his throat and glanced at Severus. Severus inclined his head and gestured between them, telling Harry without words that he could go ahead and say what he wanted. Harry nodded, his lips still set in a frown as he faced Draco.

"I sent Corners, and Severus sent Yaxley, into the Ministry to see if they could retrieve a body that Corners found," he began.

Draco listened, with only a slight flush or paling in his cheeks to say how he felt, to the story of how they had captured Leopold and the memories Severus had drawn from his head. Severus watched him all the while, and saw the subtle shades of color in his cheeks and eyes, the way he tilted his head to the side as he listened and then back upright, the way he met Harry's gaze more often than Severus's. The change of color in his face wasn't the only way to say how he felt, after all. There was more there, all sorts of signals that Severus had ignored, or missed, or taught himself to miss, in the wake of the Ashborn's creation.

_I will have to learn him again, as well as Harry. There are fewer prejudices to clear away in Draco's case, but they're more likely to be ones that I want to ignore, because they will seem simple reality to me._

At last Harry's words dried up, and Draco snapped his teeth together once before he turned to Severus. "Have you made plans yet?" he asked.

Severus shook his head. "I would most like to defang the Ministry permanently," he murmured. "It would be-satisfying to destroy Carson and Leopold for their part in this. But someone else would step up to take their places, or to claim revenge for them, since Carson seems high in the Unspeakables' hierarchy. I wish to do something that will convince the Ministry to leave us alone, not simply something that will convince a few people to do so."

Harry nodded. "That makes sense," he muttered. "I just hate to think of how destructive it'll have to be, if the Ashborn and Shield and my killing Old Snake-Face haven't convinced them yet."

"Oh, don't tell me that you're growing Gryffindor scruples on us," Draco said, rolling his eyes. "They attacked your _friends_, too, not just you. And Shield. You can risk your life all you like, and value it less than a piece of tattered old cloth, but do you really not value their lives?"

Harry surged to his feet. "I'm not talking about that!" he snapped. "It's just-there are innocents in the Ministry, too. People who had nothing to do with this, or who went along with it because they were afraid."

"Calm down, Harry." Draco's voice cut. Severus decided that he could safely settle back and let Draco handle this. Besides, he was curious to see how Harry and Draco would interact when they almost forgot he was in the room. "We're not talking about killing everyone in the Ministry. We _are _talking about frightening them so that no one else thinks this is a good idea to try again."

"It's just," Harry said, and wore down against the haughty stare Draco gave him. "But fear is its own kind of death," he muttered, and scrubbed a hand through his hair. Shield seized the hand in his jaws and held it there, though he let it go when Harry tugged at it. Severus nodded at the dragon. Draco had probably created a more vigilant guardian than he knew when he called the dragon up and bound it to Harry's soul.

"I don't care," Draco said. "At what point can you stop caring about others? If someone only went along with this because they were afraid, they still had the chance to warn us with an anonymous owl, or to go to someone in the Ministry who would have put a stop to it. They didn't. Why do we always have to work on sparing them all the time but we never get to spare ourselves? When do you get to stop being Gryffindor and be Slytherin for once?"

Harry blinked. Then he said, "Well, it's just-I learned some things about myself during the war that I don't like. I told you some of them." He flicked a faintly guilty look at Severus, who determined that he would know those things, later. "I reckon I feel like getting revenge or punishing people for being afraid might make me go too far. I might do something horrible and not realize it until later."

"This is exactly why you need us," Draco said, and when he glanced at Severus, it was to include him. But Severus contented himself with nodding and saying nothing else. "We'll do horrible things for you."

"And then I have to hold _you_ back," Harry said, a flush creeping into his cheeks for the first time. "Sorry, but that just makes me be more Gryffindor. I wish that you could stop being Slytherin for once and listen to sense."

Draco's lips quivered, and he sat down in his chair and crossed his arms tamely in his lap. "Of course, Harry," he all but chirped, and Severus felt a strange bubble in his own chest. It took him a long moment to recognize it as laughter. "What would you do, then? What's your plan for making sure the Ministry leaves us alone?"

Harry hesitated like someone caught alone on the battlefield. Then he said, "We make it public. That's sure to get Carson sacked, at least. There's enough public feeling for me to make it career suicide to go up against me openly."

"Good, she's sacked," Draco said. "And what keeps her from working against us outside the Ministry? Or other people from saying the right things openly and doing whatever they like secretly? Harry, they tried to _kill you_. They might do the same thing to me and Severus any time, because you're leaving your enemies alive behind you-"

"I would kill them first," Harry broke in, and his eyes shone with a force that Severus had imagined when they were in the Dark Lord's cells, a force that would burn down the walls, someday, and set them free.

"Why can you only set that kind of fire for us and not yourself?" Draco asked, cocking his head. "I want to protect you. I want to do the same things you do for us. And Severus wants too, as well, but he doesn't always have the words for it." He met Severus's words, and only smiled at the glare Severus couldn't prevent. "Can you let us do some of the same kind of thing that you do all the time and so well?"

Harry hesitated. Then he said, "I reckon I don't trust-any of us-not to go too far?" He flushed the next moment and sat down, rocking Shield on his shoulder, playing with his hands and not glancing up at either Severus or Draco.

"So everyone is evil," Draco said. "Possibly Shield, too, from what you told me about the way he wanted to attack Leopold. And the Ministry is full of saints of light, except for the people who wanted to kill you and used an attack on your friends to nearly do so and who would kill me and Severus, too, if they could get away with it. If we all live in a world where everyone and everything is evil, then it ought to be easy to get what we want. We'll just be _gently _evil."

Harry gave a pained laugh and shook his head. "I don't understand," he muttered. "I just know that somewhere, between the utter _shite _that I used to swallow and what you're saying, is the truth."

"But apparently undiscoverable," Severus broke in, because Draco had rolled his eyes at him in appeal and Severus felt it was time to take over. "So, we should make our plans to take out those we know have plotted against us and terrify the others. Will that make you comfortable, Harry?"

"It's not about making me comfortable," Harry said, rolling his neck back as though to ease a cramp in it. "It's about making us safe."

"Then allow us to do what we want," Severus said, leaning forwards. "And do not _dare _to distrust us until you are sure that we are doing things, in your name, that you do not want to do."

Harry blinked back and forth between them, and then leaned back and laughed. Draco started to his feet, but Severus held out one hand and shook his head. The laughter did not sound half-mad to him, which was what they would most have to fear if Harry had decided to reject everything they said.

"I was being stupid," Harry said, wiping tears from his eyes. "I wanted everything to be the same as it was when I was fighting Vol-_him_, because that would mean I was on the side of righteousness and good and so was everyone with me. But the Ministry isn't completely evil, and I'm not completely a hero, and at this point, they've made it clear that my survival isn't their priority. The only thing any of us can do is make sure that we'll survive, and that sometimes means destroying people who try to destroy us."

"Sometimes?" Draco rolled his eyes. "I'd say all the time."

Harry nodded. "Yes, I understand now," he said softly. "I was crippling myself and everyone who tried to fight with me because we had to do things in exactly the right way, but there's no way to make sure that happens. I could always be accidentally frightening someone more than they deserve, or hurting someone who might have been my friend in a different lifetime. I could make a truce with Carson and then have her try to assassinate me later. If I want to be _done _with Ministry politics, then I have to make sure that they can't hurt me anymore."

"You will still be involved in politics," Severus said, because this was a delusion that he did not want to see Harry walk away from the conversation with. "There is no way to avoid them. But you do stand the chance to escape from the endless, repetitive cycles that the Ministry would otherwise force you through, and make a few things happen according to your own rules."

Harry gave him another bright smile, and Severus could see the disagreement brewing beneath the surface-and the decision Harry had made to work with him and fight at his side anyway. "Yes, I see," he said. "There is a difference there." He paused. "So, what besides killing a bunch of them or torturing them to death, do you think would impress them enough to make them back off?"

"This," Severus said, "is where potions come in useful." And he reveled in the way they both turned towards him, with expectant faces.

* * *

"But you're sure that you're going to be all right?"

Harry nodded, scrutinizing Hermione's face closely. "Perfectly. What about _you_, though? Ron told me that one of the spells caught you on the side of the head."

Hermione flushed, as if her boyfriend and Harry talking about her when she wasn't there was something to be ashamed of, and reached up and touched what looked like a faint patch of fuzz in her hair. Harry could only make out that it was different by squinting. "I don't know why he said that," she complained. "The Healers told me it was only a minor burn, and they gave me a potion that's already grown most of the hair back again."

Harry relaxed. "Good. Well, you don't have to worry about me. Snape and Draco gave me plenty of burn salve and insisted I relax, and even if they hadn't, Shield wouldn't let me move three feet without crooning." He rolled his eyes.

Hermione didn't look as reassured as he had thought she would. "So it's settled, then," she said quietly. "You really aren't coming back to the Burrow for the rest of the month you were supposed to spend with us."

Harry caught his breath, then forced himself to lean back against the legs of the chair he was sitting in front of. On his shoulder, Shield flapped out his wings and gave Harry a warning look. "No. We thought there might be a problem with the Unbreakable Vows, but we-we worded them correctly. I can stay here, as long as we still discuss what we need to do at the end of the month."

"But you don't feel safe with us." Hermione looked away for an instant, then turned back to him. "Ron told me about Percy."

"Whatever he told them, if he told them anything, we don't know how useful it was," Harry said, and stumbled so much over the words that he had to say them again when Hermione only stared at him. This was exactly the thing he hated, the thing he'd be most afraid of. He didn't _want _to break up families. He didn't want them accusing Percy before they knew he was guilty.

"Just the suspicion is enough for Ron." Hermione sighed and leaned back against the chair behind _her_, tapping her fingers against a book Harry couldn't see the title of. "He sent an owl off to Percy to make sure that he was all right, and asked a few questions in it. But Percy hasn't replied yet."

"That could just mean he was injured in the attack," Harry pointed out. He was sure that the floating body Corners had found wasn't Percy, especially since he and Yaxley had brought it back along with Leopold and there was no trace of red hair. He would have contacted Ron at once if it had been.

Ron, and Mrs. Weasley. Harry had to wince and wince when he thought about that, about what her grief would have been. That was another reason to try and protect Percy from Snape and Draco. If they did something to hurt him, Harry knew it would drive a wedge between them and the Weasleys that they would never recover from.

"Ron doesn't think so." Hermione spent a minute watching him. "Just be careful, Harry, all right? I know you're going to do something that we probably wouldn't approve of, and I want you to be safe. That's all."

"I will be," Harry said. "And I'll come back to visit. It's just Sn-Severus and Draco get really upset if I leave the fortress right now, and Shield gets upset if I'm out of his sight. I'll give them a few days to calm down." _And for this attack on the Ministry to either convince them or not._

"Good," Hermione said. "I was worried about losing you to the Ashborn, and _them_. But I see that's silly now."

"Of course it is," Harry said, and looked at her in a way that made her flush. "How could I forget my best friends, the people I fought the war with? You'll always be important, Hermione. That's just the way things are."

"Oh, of course," Hermione said. "But I mean it's silly because Ron and I would find a way to make Snape and Malfoy regret it if they tried to keep you away from us against your will. If we had to storm the fortress and destroy all the Ashborn, then we'd do it."

Harry had to grin at that, and the image of the Ashborn dissolving in another war brought on by the sheer determination of his friends. "Yeah, you would," he said, and held out his hand. He thought he felt a faint brush of fingertips from Hermione as she extended her hand back, but that was probably only his imagination, since one of them wasn't Flooing at the moment. That didn't matter, though. It was enough.

"Good-bye for now, Harry," Hermione said. "And I won't ask. Just remember that you have our support, always."

Harry nodded. He could think of a few things that would make him lose it-for example, if he killed as many people in the Ministry as Severus and Draco and Shield would have liked him to do-but they wouldn't happen. So he sat there smiling at Hermione until she told him good-bye again and vanished from the fire, and then he stood up and went to find Draco. They'd already decided on the basic outlines of their plan to terrify the Ministry, because there was an obvious thing that they were more afraid of than anything else; now he just had to make sure that Draco was comfortable performing his part in the plan.

Well, really, that both he and Severus were comfortable. But Severus, Harry was fairly certain, had more practice than Draco in looking the unpleasant truth of his deeds in the eye and deciding that he needed to do them anyway.

* * *

"This is the only way," Draco said, uncomfortably aware that he was saying it for the fifth time, and that the words burned oddly in his mouth. Severus only gave him a single look, and then turned away. Harry's hand brushed against his arm and braced there. They had Apparated into one of the bathrooms used as entrances to the Ministry by some employees, and Draco focused on the touch rather than what the room would look like in a few minutes.

"It's the best way," Harry said. "The way that will involve the least number of people dead or still protesting at the end, and a reminder of what they owe me. Us, really, when you think about the way that you lot made sure there weren't Death Eaters still running around."

Draco felt the ripple that ran between Harry and Severus as Harry said that, acknowledgment of the Ashborn who stood around them and what would happen to them after this battle. If they were successful in terrifying the Ministry after all. If they didn't need them after this.

But Draco found it hard to think about the Ashborn and what would happen after this, even to distract himself. His heartbeat made his head sway. He was panting. He looked at the tiles beneath him and had to look away, because they swayed and danced in his vision, and he already thought he was about to throw up.

Severus's hand came to rest on his left arm, near the Dark Mark that he had transformed into the rising bird. Harry's hand remained on the right. Draco listened to their calm breathing and reminded himself, forcibly, that he wasn't the only one here with a reason to fear what they were going to do. In some ways, Harry had the most reason to be afraid, but he was the one who had suggested this and the one who had helped them refine their way past his original crude ideas. Draco had people to support him. He could do this.

"All right," he said, and drew his wand. "I want to be the one to cast the first one."

Another ripple that he didn't understand nearly as well as the last passed between Harry and Severus, probably because one of them had planned to be the first, but a moment later Harry inclined his head and said, "Of course." Severus nodded behind him, as patient and implacable as a statue coming to life.

Draco aimed his wand at the ceiling and spent what felt like the longest moment of his life composing himself. The incantation was clear in his mind, of course. It always had been ever since he had pestered his father into telling him it when he was seven. But saying it was a different thing altogether.

At last the word came out, and it didn't tremble nearly as much as he had thought it would, or at least not enough to ruin the spell.

"_Morsmordre!_"

The Dark Mark rose above them, made of deep green, curling smoke that reminded Draco of the poison the Dark Lord had once made his mother drink in front of him. He remembered the way she had writhed and thrashed and screamed, and clutched at her belly. That hadn't been what had killed her. It had only made her want to die, feeling it, and Draco and his father, watching her.

His hand shook, and Draco's head spun into darkness. Again Harry and Severus pushed their arms in against his, and again he took strength and comfort and reminded himself that he wasn't alone. He lifted his head, blinking, and stared at the floating Dark Mark. Harry leaned in and murmured, "Don't look at it, if you'd rather."

Draco nodded and stared at the floor. This time, it was comforting and even welcoming. "How far do you think Corners is by now?" he muttered.

"Probably pretty far into the water supply," Harry said, and smiled a little. Draco used the sight of that to restore himself, too, although it wasn't a pleasant smile. "Such a shame they never knew about the Water People or thought of making an alliance with one of them, or they might have been able to counter this. Or at least predict the effects."

"It is time," Severus said abruptly.

Draco glanced at him and saw his eyes half-closed, his head tilted as his senses followed the Ashborn he had assigned to travel with Corners. Draco thought it was Yaxley, since he had done so well last time and Corners seemed to like him, but he wasn't entirely sure.

"All right," Harry said, and then closed his eyes and bowed his head. Draco felt the air tighten around them, and swallowed, then breathed out. Harry's arm was still resting against his, but it felt limp and dead without Harry's concentration there. Draco shifted from one foot to the other, then noticed Severus staring at him, and fell still. His skin prickled.

Harry opened his eyes, and threw his head back. Away from him flowed a wave of wandless magic, of power so intense, that Draco this time held on to Harry's arm to keep upright. There hadn't been time to create a spell that would do what they wanted it to do, and no existing spell would. There was just Harry's will, and need, and desire.

And all that power brewing in him, magic that Draco thought hadn't been properly exercised since the Dark Lord's death, had flowed into the Ministry, and turned it into the tangled web of desires and dreams that he needed it to be tonight.

"It's done," Harry said at last, with a jerky abruptness that made Draco think he was trying to catch his breath. "Let's go." He took a step towards the toilets that were their entrance, and stumbled.

Draco and Severus moved forwards to stand on either side of him this time, and together, they went down and in.


	32. Baffle Them With Bollocks

Thank you again for all the reviews!

_Chapter Thirty-Two-Baffle Them With Bollocks_

Harry landed lightly at the bottom of the dizzying plunge through the toilet and spent a moment staring. The walls were stone around him, and as far as he knew, that was normal, though he had never been in this part of the Ministry before. But strange shimmers crawled over and occupied them, as though they were hung with the webs of Aragog and his kind. Now Harry thought he could see a flash of green, here a hint of blue, under his feet a glimpse of white. He wondered for a moment what it was.

"The magic you projected." Severus's voice was low at his ear, and his arm curling around Harry's shoulders a moment later a nice support, if still one that made Harry jump with how unexpected it was. "It changed things in the Ministry to reflect what you were feeling at the time. What you wanted them to imagine."

"The fear," Harry said quietly. "The conviction that _he _was back and that they were in danger from the Death Eaters again."

Severus nodded solemnly and turned to help Draco, who had landed in a heap on the floor. Draco scrambled up with a look at Harry that _dared _him to say anything. Harry chuckled and felt some of the constriction on his chest ease.

"That," Severus said, "is the base the potion will build from. It can affect their minds, but it will need time to spread through the water and to change to the form that will ensure the release of fumes on the air. Even then, there may be some people in the Ministry who will not drink or breathe it." He glanced at Harry. "But no one who will escape your magic, not when the very stones themselves pulse with it."

Harry found himself standing straighter. Ron or Hermione-though he had to acknowledge this was a faint possibility-might have been appalled at what he'd done, shaping reality around him so that it resembled the emotional reality at the height of the war.

There was nothing in Severus's eyes but approval. Well, approval and the lazy appraisal as his eyes ran over Harry's body that Harry had almost become used to from him. Coming now, though, it made him clear his throat and turn his gaze ahead, down the corridor.

"How much longer do you think we should give the magic to affect them?" he asked.

Draco started to open his mouth to answer, but the first wave of screams came to their ears then. Severus nodded and cast the Dark Mark into the air with little more than a flip of his wrist. Perhaps watching Draco cast it first had calmed him, Harry thought, or the way he himself had helped Draco recover from casting it had.

"It seems that we are called," Severus said, raising one eyebrow, and then swept past Harry and down the corridor without another word. Draco ran to catch up. Harry paused a moment and spent it tamping down his heartbeat and reaching up with one hand. He smiled when he realized he was feeling for Shield, who wasn't there. The dragon would ultimately obey _him_, as Draco had told him, not the other way around, and so Harry had sent him through the Ministry in disguise as Nagini.

"Show time," Harry whispered, and cast the glamour that would surround him and _heighten _him, make him appear larger than life, more real, more promising. More like what people might expect of a hero.

If the Ministry needed a second challenge from Voldemort to remind them of what they owed Harry, and what might happen a second time if not for the Ashborn, then they would have it.

* * *

Draco could feel it everywhere, the magic Harry had unleashed, pulsing around them and reaching out with sly tendrils to rub against his mind. He had taken several potions that Severus had promised would clear his thoughts and keep them free of outside influences before they left the Ashborn fortress, but he shivered anyway.

_Does Harry have any idea of how powerful he is? Maybe he can't cast spells as strong as some the Dark Lord knew, but he could change the world if he wanted, just by imposing his will on it._

It was fortunate for them that Harry wanted no such thing. And by the end of tonight, Draco hoped that everyone in the Ministry would know it.

They met the first Aurors in the corridor beyond the one where they had entered, struggling with the phantasms of Death Eaters that surrounded them. Draco thought he caught a glimpse of a pale face like his father's, beneath pale hair, and turned away, feeling as though someone had punched him in the gut.

But it was only one illusion among many, and the Aurors wouldn't have fought the illusions at all if not for Harry's magic that induced fear and Severus's potion that brought certain memories dancing to the surface of their minds. So Draco turned back and got ready to play his part, harder in some ways than casting the first Dark Mark. Harder because it was so easy.

"Harry Potter!"

Severus was a magnificent actor when he wanted to be, as one would expect of someone who had spent so many years fooling the Dark Lord into believing him a loyal servant. Draco turned and saw him aiming his wand at Harry at the full extent of his arm, his body braced as if to hurl a lethal curse. His robes billowed behind him, and his face was set, and Draco wanted to fuck him badly enough that the throb of his cock almost distracted him from the part he had to play.

Then he shook his head and took his place beside Severus, making sure to let his left sleeve fall back. Their Marks remained unchanged, but it would look enough like a Dark Mark to someone under the influence of potion and magic who had only a fleeting glimpse.

Shrieks came from behind them, even from the Aurors. Draco found himself smirking. There were many, many things about this plan that he didn't enjoy, but this one, he did. Frightening people who hadn't done shit for him when he was trapped with Voldemort, frightening people who would have treated him and his parents badly if they'd ever caught them? Yes, that he could get behind.

Harry looked at them across the width of the gap separating them, and his eyes shone with something Draco had never seen directed at him, despite all their conflicts in Hogwarts. Draco flinched before he could stop himself. Harry noticed, and something in his face softened, the most indication he could give that he'd noticed, with an audience watching them.

But then they had to begin the mock duel, and they did it with a curse exploding from Severus's wand. Harry leaped to the side and deflected the curse into a wall with a Shield Charm, where it cracked the stone. Then he advanced, and the shield came with him, holding the magic back.

One of the tight ring of Aurors tried to explode outwards at them. Draco immediately Stunned him. They couldn't have anyone interfering in this fight, or it would become obvious immediately that they weren't _really _trying to hit each other.

Severus countered Harry's shields with a showy hex that dissolved them in a blaze of sparks. Harry leaped over the next spell that tried to bite his ankles and cast a curse that hit Severus in the chest.

Draco held his breath. They had rehearsed the spells for this duel and the motions necessary for them several times, but he thought Harry's memories might have taken him over and made him strike back at Severus harder than he otherwise would.

Severus, however, only clasped a hand over the stricken spot and staggered, the way he had in all their practices. Draco released the breath he'd been holding. Severus straightened and sneered at Harry. "You would do such a thing to _me_? To the man who survived the Dark Lord's fall?"

"To the man who still can't say his name, and flinches when he hears it," Harry snapped back, moving forwards, his eyes narrowed. "And to the man who was cowardly enough to make Unbreakable Vows and then try to goad me into defending myself so he could break them. Yeah, I'll curse a coward, and bring him in to Azkaban, too!"

The Aurors cheered. Draco wondered if any of them had noticed that Harry had set up a subtle barrier between them and Draco and Severus now, one that was only visible if you squinted. It looked like silver sparks, but would burn and throw them back if they ventured any nearer. All of them would believe that it was a Death Eater who had cast it, of course.

_Or former Death Eater. _If their plan worked as well as Harry thought it should, then they would achieve a delicate balance between convincing the Ministry they were still Death Eaters and that they were a new and relentless threat in the Ashborn.

"I am far from a _coward_," Severus said, and Draco suspected that the anger thickening his voice was not all feigned. He had reacted much the same way when Harry called him that name as they ran from the Tower, after all. "I am someone who commands more and older magic than you will ever know of, or ever dream."

"Really?" Harry took a long step forwards. "Let's see some, then!"

Severus gave him a cold smile and nodded to Draco. This was part of it. They had to also show the Ministry that Severus's followers were dangerous, and Harry was necessary as a defense against them.

Draco yelled some fancy nonsense syllables that would no doubt set the listeners puzzling about what language it was, while speaking the incantation in his mind only as loud as he could.

A snake of misty blue light manifested around Harry, binding his limbs and hissing into his face. Harry froze, his eyes wide and his head falling back as though the snake had pulled it there.

Draco swallowed. Harry had reassured him over and over that this spell was all right, that the person who made it up had only designed it to restrain and not to hurt, and that if something went wrong, Harry could hiss at the snake and it should obey him and uncoil. But Draco couldn't shake the fear that he had done it wrong, or rather, too right, with too much power.

They had to do some of that, though. Be too weak, and the Ministry would thank Harry for defending them against the threat this one time, and then go back to plotting ways to get rid of him. Draco waited.

Harry flexed his muscles and struggled for long minutes, until Draco wondered why none of the Aurors had noticed what was going on. Surely they would think it strange that Severus and Draco hadn't cast another spell to finish Harry off, or taken hostages, or at least turned and run away?

When he glanced at them, their eyes were glazed, and they leaned subtly forwards, closer to each other than the walls. Draco relaxed as he remembered. The fear and the magic that Harry had sent hammering home, as well as the potion spread through the water supply, had multiple purposes, but this was one of them: to confuse the rational thought processes, to make what the Aurors and others would see here today harder for them to process and reason through.

Harry finally straightened up and broke the snake's coils with an enormous, heroic flex of his shoulders. Then he aimed his wand at Severus, and his voice was deep and quiet. "So you have your _minion _do that instead of you yourself? Maybe you just don't have a lot of magic _left_, old man. Wouldn't that be something? If you've held onto your position in the Death Eaters and the Ashborn through intimidation and nothing else?"

Severus held up one hand. Streamers of red light erupted from it, thanks to a spell Harry had cast with his wand behind his back, and that thoroughly distracted everyone from Severus's actual wand movement.

Harry froze abruptly, staring straight ahead, and then crashed to the ground. It was a simple Body-Bind, but with the streamers that flew away from Severus's hand and started running into Harry's mouth and nose-harmless light, in reality-it looked much worse than that. The Aurors were screaming and crying now, and adding to their picture of a duel for the ages.

Severus turned a smile on them so cruel that they all shut up immediately. Draco wondered what they would say if they knew that such a smile only made him want to fuck Severus all the more.

_They'd laugh. _Draco snapped his mind back to his place in the plan, and held it there as hard as he could. They were here to do a specific thing, and if they broke too much of the pattern, there was always the chance that someone wouldn't believe them, and could convince other people.

Harry suddenly coughed, and vomited out the streamers of light, or so it would appear to the audience. They had dissipated when Severus's spell was done, and so had the Body-Bind. Harry now stood up, and made each movement slow enough-bracing his palms on the floor, bowing his head, straightening his spine moment by moment-that Draco thought none of the Aurors were breathing when he finished his ascent.

Harry turned his head towards Severus, and his sneer seared them both. Draco backed away a step that wasn't planned. He would be so _glad _when this bloody pretense was done.

"As I said, _old _man," Harry said, "no magic that can conquer me."

And he flourished his wand in a way that would gather in the eyes and dazzle them further, and he and Severus launched into their duel.

Draco's part in this was mainly to stay out of the way. He fell back, and further back, until he felt his arse touch the barrier of sparks. He stayed there, his breath locked in his throat, his eyes locked on Harry and Severus, and there were times when he did _forget _to breathe and coughed until he could start again.

They were magnificent, both of them, in the play that looked like deadly serious spellwork to everyone else in the corridor and like sport to Draco. He wanted to fuck _both _of them.

He realized that wasn't the most helpful notion ever, and decided to say nothing about it. But no one could stop him from watching.

* * *

Severus had expected to have to hold back and cast more than one distraction spell that would convince the watchers Harry's curses had landed.

Instead, he found himself understanding why both the Dark Lord and several of his most experienced duelists had died fighting Harry Potter.

Harry fought with speed, strength, skill, and concentration. Severus possessed each himself, and had seen many who had at least one or two of those gifts. By themselves, they would not have sufficed to make Harry his equal.

But Harry also had _instinct_, or the quality that Severus had often heard called that and which he knew no better name for. He knew to drop to one knee when Severus had planned to aim a spell at his head or midsection, and he often countered a curse while it was still in the air, as though he had known what could come next. He halted himself before he could hit the barrier he had put up to protect them, or Draco, who stood watching with his face as pale as salt. He leaped to his feet when he had to, and closed in with a rush. Severus was caught without understanding what had happened, staggering between the net Harry cast in front of him and the expectation that he should try to give the audience a show.

Harry pulled his own punch, slamming his net into the floor as though it had been caught by one of Severus's shields. It would take close attention indeed to notice that he had directed it there, and Severus knew none of their audience would be capable of choosing that by now.

"Do something," Harry mouthed at Severus, and pulled back to stare at him.

Severus did, catching him off-guard with a Blasting Curse that nearly slammed him into the opposing wall, though of course he also cast sharp blue sparks and half-tongues of fire that made the spell seem far more spectacular than a Blasting Curse. Harry came up with a smile and fired off another one in response, which Severus slipped with a graceful dodge.

Then they closed in, and their duel became more like the deadly storms of wandwork that Severus had seen when the Dark Lord commanded two of his Death Eaters to fight for his entertainment. Back and forth, spell after spell, countercurses and shields slamming up before them and sometimes catching and sometimes not, muscles aching and eyes bright and gritty and exhausted with missed sleep.

Harry twisted to the side and lifted his left arm, and one of Severus's spells razed a line of blood down it. One of Harry's spells made Severus hop and have to cure his suddenly burning foot. Another one singed half Harry's hair away, and he cut open Severus's cheek with a swing from an invisible blade. There were snakes, and miniature bolts of lightning, and Transfigurations that filled the air between them with chattering insects, and a rain of spiders that might have swarmed into Harry's eyes if he hadn't Vanished them as quickly as they appeared.

And in the midst of it, Harry caught Severus's eye and grinned in exhilaration.

_This is what he is meant to be doing, _Severus thought. It was no wonder that Harry had no patience with politics. He was meant for the battlefield, and the way he could settle the issues that might arise with someone else was a duel. He would have done well in the far older days of wizarding politics, when duels for honor were a regular matter and single combat had settled wars before armies could fight them.

But these were not the ancient days, and Severus would have to help Harry find some other channel for that restless magic and shining power.

For now, they were moving to the end of their duel, and he was ready to cast the final spell that would come across as a "mistake" and allow Harry to forcibly Apparate him out of the Ministry. In reality, he would vanish behind a Disillusionment Charm, and the Auror witnesses would be left with the impression that Harry had managed to shatter the Ministry's wards and do it all without breaking a sweat.

Then someone said, "L-let him go! Leave him alone! Or I swear I'll kill him, and you know we're trained to do that!"

Severus turned and stared. One of the Aurors had broken through the barrier of sparks. It had left her robes on fire, but she had shrugged out of them and ignored the pain that Severus could make out in her trembling limbs. She held her wand to Draco's throat, and although her hand shook, as well, Severus was sure that she could cut his throat before either of them could do anything.

Draco could strike in defense of himself, but whether he could kill, as might be required, Severus did not know. He had been unable to when his parents' freedom and lives hung on the end of his wand, after all. On the other hand, the woman was a stranger, and not the Headmaster who had presided over the school he had attended for six years. That might make a difference.

While the notions raced through Severus's mind, he saw Harry standing with his face and his wand hand still. Of course. He could not interfere without causing their plan to collapse, the plan that they had woven so carefully to convince the Aurors that they were enemies after all.

Then a spark flowed into Harry's eyes and into his smile, and he stood straighter and taller than his mere height could account for. He caught Severus's eye for a moment, and he did not mouth _Follow my lead. _He did not need to.

Harry stepped forwards and raised his voice as though he wanted everyone in the Ministry to hear him. With the potion and the magic he had sent ringing through the air, Severus considered, that might come close to happening. "So you would take my enemy away from me? You would kill _him_, the one I have a right to kill? He was going to kill Dumbledore at one point. He le Death Eaters into the school, and injured one of my adopted family, the Weasleys. You'd take the right to punish him away from me?"

The Auror stared at Harry, and suddenly her hands shook a lot more. She said slowly, "No, I wouldn't do that. But-"

"Then step back, and let me have him." Harry jerked his head at Severus. "It will hurt him to watch him die, and that's all I need right now."

Severus couldn't keep his chin from lifting, or his fingers from tightening on his wand. He hoped that Harry knew what he was doing. It sounded like another half-brilliant plan so easy to turn in the wrong direction that Severus's soul revolted against it.

But the Auror moved back, caught in the web of awe that radiated from _Harry Potter_, and Harry stuck his own wand beneath Draco's chin and used it to lift his head. Draco blinked at him. He had no water in his eyes, Severus saw, but something worse, the shadows of the prison cell where they had spent time together.

Harry and Draco gazed into each other's eyes for long moments. Severus knew how the Aurors would read it: the last confrontation of two longtime rivals and enemies. He had no idea what the true reading was.

And then Harry said, as if speaking from the kind of position of lofty wisdom that Albus often had, "But why should I kill _him_? He's not the one who hurt me all through those years. The one who did is dead. He's part of the Ashborn, and he was part of the Death Eaters, and if he acts against me, I have to stop him. But killing him is something else again, and _I _am the only one who decides how to punish him."

"If he acts against the Ministry, then you should!" yelled one of the Aurors pressing forwards against the barrier, and not heeding the way that sparks leaped up to scorch his beard.

Harry turned a slow glance on the Aurors that made them pay attention to the sparks, or at least use them as an excuse. When they had retreated to what Harry obviously felt was an acceptable distance, he started pacing up and down in front of them, staring at them all the while. Severus raised his eyebrows in respect and kept his distance.

"You don't understand," Harry said. "I should punish them because they went against the Ministry? When the _Ministry _has been against me from the beginning, and tried to kill me at the party the other night?"

A few of the Aurors started or paled, and Severus marked their faces.

"I want this stupid war to stop," Harry said, and Severus knew those words were not part of a pretense. "And I want the Ministry to stop acting as if I haven't done _enough _by stopping it. Obviously, I haven't if the Dark Mark is here and if Death Eaters still want me dead." He glared at Severus. "But that's my job. The Ministry's job is to use the peace to guide the wizarding world. Not punish me for not being the hero they need, or think they need."

The Aurors stared at him, and then the woman who had held Draco captive said, "But what are you going to _do_? How are you going to make them obey you, or stop attacking you, when nothing you've done so far has worked?" By the end of her words, her voice was all but twitching, and she pushed towards Harry as if she was going to thump him in the chest.

Harry gave her another cold look that stopped her in her tracks, then shook his head. "Not even Unbreakable Vows hold them," he said. "But a bargain might, if I can find out what they want." He turned towards Severus. "What _do _you want?"

Severus caught his breath and his tongue, and refrained from blurting out something that might have ruined Harry's plans immediately. He considered instead, and then said, "You know that the Dark Lord is not completely dead."

"I'm not convinced of that," Harry said.

On cue, a hiss and a coiling motion came from one of the smaller corridors, and Nagini came out into the light. Severus felt his own muscles coiling in response, and nearly struck before he thought. Of course, this was Shield, disguised as the Dark Lord's snake. He shook his head and pointed with his wand towards the illusion, smiling at Harry.

"I thought you had killed his faithful companion," he said. "Are you telling me that you did not?"

Harry turned and feigned horror well enough that one of the Aurors fainted. "Nagini" reared her head and hissed, swaying back and forth. Under the glamour, that was probably Shield begging to come to his true master, but Severus could see no trace of it. Harry had done an incredible job with the illusion spell. Or perhaps it had taken so well because Shield was bound so closely to Harry's soul.

"It _could _be real," Harry breathed. "It _could _be true." He glanced back and forth between Severus and Draco, and his face flickered with doubt. Then he straightened and threw back his shoulders.

"How close do you think you've come to resurrecting him, then?" he demanded.

Severus thought he managed his grimace of a smile as well as Harry managed his own acting, then. It was one thing to wake from nightmares that the Dark Lord had managed a resurrection, and another to talk, even in play, of doing it himself.

But Harry had asked if they would be able to play their parts, and both he and Draco had said yes. So they could. So they would. It was no harder than Draco mustering up the courage to cast the first Dark Mark, after all.

"Fairly close," Severus said. "We would not describe the whole of the process to you, but..." He paused meaningfully, and Harry scowled at him. Severus thought part of it was genuine, driven by nerves, so he did not wait as long as he had thought he would. "But there are advantages to a world without him, I must admit. I have more freedom than I did before, if not as much power."

"So power is what you want," Harry said, seizing on the word like any good negotiator. "All right. But how do you think that you're going to get that, in a world where the bargain we made for peace didn't work?"

"I think," Severus said, and put _many _pauses between his words this time, to give the impression that he was considering it, "that treating with us as an independent power would be enough. The Ministry considered us a threat before you came to us as a hostage, but not enough to fear our wrath when they attacked you. Perhaps a bargain that we would not proceed in our resurrection of the Dark Lord, and would destroy the implements we have gathered so far, if the Ministry promised to leave us alone in the future?" He turned and raised an eyebrow at the gathered Aurors. Draco, who had stepped up to his side by now and away from the barrier, sneered in turn.

"We can't make a bargain like that," said the Auror who had captured Draco, but she was staring at Nagini. Everyone knew about Harry's killing of the snake; it was the first tale the _Daily Prophet _had dragged out of him when the war ended. Even Severus had heard of it, though from the gossip of Death Eater jailers at the time rather than the front page. "We don't have the authority!"

"But someone else has the authority to lead you to war with the Ashborn and try to kill me?" Harry gave her a lopsided smile. "I'll accept you as deciding for everyone if _you_ accept that it was only a tiny part of the Ministry that decided renewed war would be preferable."

"We need to leave you alone, too," the woman whispered, staring into his eyes as if she was a bird and _Harry _was Nagini. "So that you can-you'd fight You-Know-Who for us, if he really came back? You would?"

"Yes," Harry said, pausing himself as though he had to think about whether he wanted to do that _again _for a Ministry that had proven itself ungrateful, "I would."

And that was how it worked, the whirl of fear and spells and spectacular shows and half-logical arguments catching the Aurors up and bearing them along through what they would have questioned otherwise. That was how it came to be that six Aurors knelt on the floor and placed their hands over Harry's and swore-though not by Unbreakable Vows-to leave the Ashborn alone and leave Harry alone, as well, because they couldn't survive the anger of the first or the loss of the other. And all the while, Shield in his covering as Nagini danced back and forth, emitting hisses long and angry enough to convince anyone that he was the real thing.

Severus was standing ready to cast the spell they had agreed upon the moment the swearing finished. Harry had argued hardest against this part, but Severus had pointed out that all their effort would be for naught if no one believed the Aurors when they told their tale. That was the disadvantage of a potion and spells to induce fear: every experience inside it would seem hallucinatory, and other people could deny what had happened in this particular corridor.

But not if Severus cast the spell that he did then, standing behind Draco so no one would note the wand movements and doing it nonverbally so no one could hear and suspect. _Imperio persuasione._

The magic rose away from him, a sensation like smoke against the skin and in the eyes without the visibility of smoke, and streamed towards the distant walls. Like Harry's will, it leached into the stones and began to radiate outwards, making itself part of the Ministry where so many people labored.

Severus sent, not the image of the ceremony, which would make many people suspicious if it appeared in their head, but the _conviction _that the Aurors in this corridor felt, born from a mixture of their horror at Nagini and their fear of the Dark Lord's name and the dazzlement of the duel. The emotions would twine together, reinforcing each other, until all those who spent a substantial amount of time in the building came to believe that the bargain was for the best, and that the Ashborn should be allowed to remain unmolested and Harry should be able to stand outside the toils of Ministry politics so he could fight the one enemy who must cross all boundaries.

Harry had said it was like Legilimency and mind control, and Severus had acknowledged that, and not budged. It was not the same as slavery. If someone fought hard enough against the emotions, questioned enough, they could rupture that conviction. And there were always those, like Harry, who had a natural resistance to the Imperius Curse and its varieties.

But the majority of the Ministry was as mindless and spineless as a column of ants. They would go where they were led, and this was the only way to secure permanent peace and freedom for themselves.

The Aurors finished their swearing, and the tide of magic left Severus exhausted, though he did not sway because Draco was beside him, keeping him from falling. Together, they turned away and left with a distant dignity. Harry was talking the Aurors around, dazzling them with another wave and round of words, and of arguments that would spin apart like gossamer if too closely examined, except that they didn't intend to give anyone that chance. And he was giving them time for the spell to work.

It was fitting that when the Aurors again looked for the Ashborn, they would find them gone, vanished as mysteriously as they'd come.

* * *

Draco scowled at nothing as he helped Severus out of the Ministry, to one of the bathrooms where they could depart. Of course it was for the best that they were leaving, since remaining there would only distract the Aurors and the different kind of spell that Harry was trying to weave with his words, but it still irritated him.

He had done _nothing _to help them. He'd stood there like a useless stick and let some jumped-up Gryffindor capture him. And he hadn't participated in the duel that Severus and Harry had used, simultaneously, to convince the Aurors that the Ashborn would be hard to challenge and that Harry had the necessary skills to protect them from the Dark Lord.

That he knew he _wouldn't _have been able to keep up, that his level of skill wasn't up to theirs, just hurt him like lemon juice stinging an old wound.

But he thought about it, and he thought about the last time someone had praised him for what he _was _good at. In the forest, with Laughter and Thera, negotiating the contract and contact between centaurs and werewolves.

And he hadn't been able to kill Dumbledore that night on the Tower, either, and he could only torture when someone forced him to do it with dire consequences on his parents or Severus. He wasn't good at violence. He didn't have that brooding, restless, crackling power in him that Harry did.

But.

If the peace they had argued and fought for today held, then Harry's kind of power wouldn't do them as much good. Harry had already shown that either he needed something to do or he retreated into himself and brooded. Draco was the one whose power with words could help them in peace, the one who would help hold it together as he met with members of the pure-blood alliance and members of the Ministry, perhaps, more sensible people who would realize what happened and how they had to counter the idiots.

Draco smiled. His greatest enemy was still himself, his lack of self-confidence and his immediate envy of any gifts he didn't share. But he could do _this_. He was the one who would probably be most valuable as the years went on, even if he had to bring Harry or Severus to the table with him on occasion. Harry didn't have the patience for negotiations, and neither did Severus, in a different manner; he preferred potions to people, and short-term goals to long-term ones.

So Draco smiled as they left the Ministry, and as he fed Severus a Strengthening Potion, and as they discussed strategy against the Ministry for the months to come.


	33. To the Table

Thank you again for all the reviews!

_Chapter Thirty-Three-To the Table_

"You're all right, then." Hermione leaned forwards as if she was going to count Harry's fingers through the fireplace.

Harry nodded, and then reached up to adjust the weight of Shield, clinging to his shoulder. The dragon hadn't left him since he came home from the Ministry and took the spell off him that made Shield look like Nagini. And Harry could understand why, really; Shield had hated being separated from him for a few hours, which hadn't happened since Draco made him. But his claws kept catching in Harry's shirt, and his tail half-burning Harry's neck, because it was wound so tightly around it. "Yes. And I think the spells on the Ministry will hold. No one who was there could escape them."

"That's why you told Arthur to stay home, then." Hermione still flushed a bit when she called her future father-in-law Arthur, but Harry reckoned she would get used to it.

"Yeah. I didn't want him caught in it." Harry shrugged. "And I suppose he might be in a little bit of danger from going to work in the Ministry every day, but I don't think so. When he comes home and listens to Ron and the rest of them talk, then he'll figure out that any bollocks they talk about me is just that, bollocks."

Hermione nodded. Harry could see the reserve in her eyes, and he smiled. Hermione had trouble approving of any plan that she hadn't been involved in from the beginning and had a strong hand in forming.

As if she knew what he was thinking, Hermione cleared her throat and changed the subject. "What about Percy?"

"I didn't bother warning him," Harry said, shrugging again. "So I suppose that he might believe what they're saying about me. He might anyway, given that he hasn't said anything about the attack at the Ministry party to anyone."

"No," Hermione said, although Harry was sure she _had _meant that. "I meant, what are you going to do about him? Is Snape going to insist that you question him? Or torture him?" There was a visible hesitation in front of those last words.

"I wouldn't let that happen," Harry said, and leaned forwards so far that Shield nearly slid off his shoulder and over his head. "You know-you _ought _to know that I wouldn't let that happen, Hermione. You _know _it."

"Of course," Hermione said, and then seemed to steel herself to say what was lurking in her head. "I just wonder-you don't want Snape to control the Ashborn, either, but you let him use the spell that would bind those emotional impressions to the Aurors' minds. I wondered if you would let him torture someone if he begged you hard enough."

Harry forced himself not to get angry, and just to consider the question. Hermione, and maybe Ron, must still be uncertain about Severus and Draco if she would ask that, and there were times that Harry looked into their eyes and saw something alien moving there.

"No," he said at last. "If-if someone who had information that would save your lives or their lives was here, maybe, and not talking. But even then, torture doesn't often get the truth out of someone. _You _know that."

Hermione shuddered lightly and looked away. She had tortured Bellatrix once when she got in their way and wounded Ron, and even now, it was the one part of the war that they most rarely referred to.

"Fine," Hermione whispered. "But what are you going to do now? If you've settled the problems with the Ministry and have Shield to protect you, then you should be able to come back to the Burrow for a visit."

Harry nodded slightly. "But I don't know if Severus and Draco would want me to."

Hermione looked happy to have something she could legitimately glare at him about. "They don't _control _you!"

"No," Harry said. "And the reason that they don't is that they know I wouldn't stand for it. But I do find it worthwhile to get along with them, or there wouldn't have been any reason to go with them to the Ministry and try to avoid getting them upset, or to make Unbreakable Vows in the first place." He sighed at the blank look Hermione was giving him. "Hermione, _please. _I know that it's not easy for you and Ron, but I want to get along with them. That means asking them before I do something they might think is dangerous."

Hermione frowned and drummed her fingers on something Harry couldn't see. "The way you would ask Ron and me during the war?"

Harry nodded. "Exactly like that." He did think that it might be a little different, because if everything went well, Draco and Severus would be his lovers instead of his friends, but he wasn't about to shove that in Hermione's face.

Hermione sighed as though someone was asking her to snort a dragon out her nose. "Fine. But I do hope that you come and visit us this weekend, if no other time."

"I'll see what I can do," Harry said, and smiled at her until she disappeared from his fireplace. Then he shook his head and leaned back against his bed, stroking Shield, who had wormed his way under Harry's chin and seemed intent on providing all the warmth to Harry's neck that he could ever need.

"How did my life get like this?" Harry asked the dragon. "I could swear that yesterday I was a hostage, and the only people I was important to for myself were Ron and Hermione and the other Weasleys."

Shield didn't answer, but only hooked his claws into Harry's shirt. Harry rolled his eyes, stood up while trying to make sure that Shield didn't shift and scratch him again, and went to find Draco.

* * *

Draco marked his place in the old book with a finger and looked up. He'd known that Harry was standing next to his table in the library for a while, but he had really wanted to finish reading the paragraph that he was in the middle of, since he thought it would make more sense if he swallowed all the ideas at once.

"What is it?" he asked, when Harry didn't immediately say something. Instead, he stared at Draco's book as if trying to count the number of words on the page.

Harry jumped and laughed uneasily. Then he said, "I want to know-if I wanted to be part of the pure-blood alliance again, how would I go about it?"

Draco leaned back, studying Harry. Then he waved Harry into a chair across from him, so he could go on looking at him more conveniently. Harry sat, Shield draped across his shoulder like a silver blanket that writhed in different directions between different minutes. Harry stroked the dragon's neck and met Draco's eye with what, Draco had to admit, was commendable boldness.

"The hardest thing will be deciding how you should apologize to the centaurs," Draco said, deciding that Harry could do with a warning. "They were offended, and, more to the point, hurt by what you did to them. I don't know that any single apology will be enough." But he didn't know that it wouldn't be, either, Draco had to admit to himself. Persuading Thera to accompany him to the Forbidden Forest and speak with Laughter was the most work he had done with the centaurs in a long time. At the moment, they remained in their garden and he tried to decide what the hell should happen next.

Thera might be content with that state of affairs, but Kleianthe wouldn't be, not forever. Draco expected each day to hear that she had left and gone back to the Forest, taking her daughter with her.

Harry sighed and scratched at the back of his skull. Shield moved his head over to rest his triangular chin on the spot. "And the vampires probably won't want to become part of the alliance, not when I fucked up the meeting with their leader so badly."

Draco shook his head, a little surprised that Harry still didn't understand this. It would have allowed him to feel better about himself-

_Oh. Of course. That's why he made no bloody attempt to think through it. He never seems to think he should feel comfortable or that there's a chance he might be in the right._

Draco sighed and then tried to restrain the sigh as Harry stared at him. "You negotiated with the leader of one group of vampires," he said. "She may think of herself as the one who rules all of them, but I assure you, there are bound to be vampires out there who don't agree with that view. And if it turns out that we _have _alienated them forever, then we can ally with a group of vampires who live beyond Britain. Or simply leave them out of the pure-blood alliance. The old alliance included them, but ours and theirs may not be exactly the same. Not as massive, for one thing."

Harry nodded, but went on stroking Shield with one hand, which Draco had come to note as a sign that he needed reassurance. Draco felt more than a little smug to have provided the creature from which he drew that reassurance. "Oh. Um...is there anything I can do to help the alliance, then? Or did my fuck-ups with the vampires and the centaurs exile me from it forever?"

Draco didn't roll his eyes, but it was a near thing. "You can help. I just don't know _how_, right now. Why don't you go see Severus? I know he wanted to speak with you this morning anyway. Something about Incognita and the Ashborn."

Harry's face looked a little grey as he stood. "Something about freeing them, I'm sure, and the toll it takes on him."

"If it takes too much of a toll, then leave them enslaved," Draco said. "They provide useful guardians and servants, and I don't think we could have moved that potion through the water in the Ministry without Yaxley."

"We had Corners," Harry said, and the grey tinge faded. Now his face looked like it was made of diamond. "And I can't allow them to stay bound like that. Severus was wrong to do it in the first place."

Draco rolled his eyes openly this time. "You weren't there in the glory days of the Dark Lord, or you would have understood immediately why Severus wanted the Death Eaters under control, and why we had no chance of peace until it happened."

Harry winced. "No, I wasn't there-"

"And if you have a guilt attack over _that_, I'm never speaking to you again," Draco finished, letting his voice bite, crisp as frost. "You were a bit busy at that exact moment _kneeling over the smoking remains of the Dark Lord. _As long as you remember that, we should get along fine." He leaned back and kicked a foot into the air, then winced when it hit the underside of the table instead of flying up in the fine gesture he'd envisioned. "Suffice it to say that I understand why Severus did it, to feel safe. Yes, the Ashborn guard and protect him against the people who might have tried to harm him, but they also protect him from what they used to be, and the reminder of his own crimes and failures. Let the past lie, if it hurts him."

"There could still be good in them," Harry countered, and Draco recognized this wasn't an argument he could win. Laughter had called him a good negotiator, but that presumed there was good faith on the other side and something they wanted enough to listen. Harry just wanted the Ashborn free. Draco had neither the power to do that nor the will to oppose him, if he wanted to force it badly enough.

Draco rolled his eyes. "Then I think he'll agree if you _also _agree to help him bear the consequences. Give him potions for the headaches, keep an eye on the Ashborn, and be ready to do something about them if they attack."

"Incognita didn't."

Draco snorted. "She also stayed in the fortress when we went to the Ministry, did you notice? Severus did ask her to join the attack, but she's still a bit hesitant when it comes to performing complex magic. You can't expect someone to recover immediately from that kind of complicated Legilimency and binding."

"All the more reason for Severus not to have done it in the first place." Harry braced his hands on the table, and Shield raised his head and glanced at Draco, flicking his tongue out past shark-edged teeth.

"But he _didn't care_," Draco said, deciding that he probably couldn't emphasize that enough. "He didn't care what they might eventually suffer, because he never intended to release them in the first place, and he would have dealt with them if any of them showed mental degradation from it. Can you understand now, Harry? It's great if you want them free, but you're going to have to do the majority of the lifting yourself, because Severus and I don't care."

Harry blinked for a bit. Then he closed his mouth and said thoughtfully, "Yeah. Yeah, that makes sense. I'll go and help him."

And away he went, with Draco raising an eyebrow at his back. _I really doubt that he does understand everything I'm asking him to do, or that he's asking of Severus._

But this wasn't Draco's concern. He went back to his book, and to the careful layers of diplomacy and compliment and insult and aggravation that the old pure-blood alliance seemed to tolerate. Draco wanted something at least as flexible for his new one.

* * *

Severus raised his head and then one eyebrow at the knock on the door. It did not sound like Draco's, but he had expected that Harry would wait longer before approaching him. What he was asking Severus to do, and what he would have to do in return, did seem rather more work than he must have thought it was. "Come in."

Harry walked into the lab and gave the cauldrons a look that made Severus's lips twitch. It seemed he had managed to instill a lifelong loathing of Potions in Harry-which, considering his lack of talent in the subject, might be all to the good.

Harry then took a chair across from him and said, "Draco said you wanted to talk to me. Had you chosen someone to free?"

No doubt about it. Harry's eyes shone, and he tapped one foot against the floor for a moment before he remembered and restrained himself. But his hands clenched in his lap, and even the way that Shield nudged his head against his neck didn't seem able to restrain Harry or call his attention back. He touched the dragon's head in a stroke that ended too soon as he leaned forwards and dragged his hands away.

"Yes," Severus said, trying not to calculate how soon the fire in Harry's eyes might be turned on him for something other than repairing what Harry saw as a mistake. He reached out and touched Yaxley's mind, bidding him come to the lab. "Since he was so useful in the expedition to the Ministry, I thought you would agree that Yaxley was a wise choice."

Harry shrugged. "I only know the really unwise ones, Bellatrix and Greyback. I didn't know the other Death Eaters all that well."

"And yet you want them free anyway, even not knowing their crimes," Severus murmured, remembering the evening that Yaxley had hung Draco by his wrists for hours while Severus sat by, not interfering because something worse would happen. He had taken a particular pleasure in snaring Yaxley's mind while Draco watched, after that. "You are sure?"

"It's a greater crime to keep them captive."

Severus found that he could admire the sight of Harry as a determined fanatic as long as the thing Harry was fanatic about was not killing him or Draco. He smiled slightly. "I wonder, will you forgive me even when they are free?"

Harry blinked and stared at him. Shield stood up on his shoulder, wings spread and trembling as though he was going to fly at Severus. But Severus did not regard that. He watched Harry instead, and after a few moments, Harry swallowed and slid slowly down against the back of his chair, his hands in his lap.

"I don't hate you for it now," he whispered. "I can forgive you. I think-I think if you and Draco had argued against this enough, I would have let the Ashborn stay enslaved." He shook his head. "I don't understand that. Surely I ought to consider you an enemy and never forgive you if you wanted to keep them?"

"I do want to keep them," Severus said. "But I also want to please you, and you have shown me evidence that it's a good idea."

"What evidence?" Harry eyed him, called back from his half-fugue state, Severus thought, by the compliment. "What do you mean? So far I've been demanding or guilt-ridden. If you're talking about our duel-"

"You showed me just now that you care more about me and Draco than about abstract moral principles," Severus said. "I had hesitated before in part because I wondered if you would insist on sacrificing us to them, should we do something that you did not like. But you are more human than I thought you were, more fallible, closer to us. This is the kind of person I could take as a lover."

Harry flushed, but nodded. "I know what you mean. Even if I think I should be different at the same time."

Severus shrugged broadly. "That is up to you. I have made my choice, and he is here now." Yaxley knocked on the door of the lab. "Shall I call him in and make the first motions towards his freedom?"

Harry bit his lip for a moment. Then he nodded again. "And I'm sorry about what I'm putting you through," he added, as though Severus was someone he had forced into this against his will.

Severus thought it best to nod, stand, and call to Yaxley to come in, aloud as well as through the Mark. Lingering too long on the magnitude of the change would only convince Harry that he had to martyr himself further, or else he would martyr Severus. Once, Severus would not have believed he could tire of contests of guilt and assigning blame to others, but now he did, and easily. He wished for mental quietude to concentrate on his work.

Yaxley came in and stood in front of him. Severus directed him to the chair instead. He had decided to stand this time, in case that would help to ease the headache. He was partially convinced that his last one had come from venturing too far into Incognita's mind, and losing himself in the disentangling. If he had to stand, he would spare some of his focus to keeping his balance, and might keep himself back and keep from expending too much effort.

"Someone must watch him in case he is about to break free and lash out," he told Harry. "I entrust that task to you."

Harry blinked and opened his mouth, perhaps to ask what signs he should watch for, but then stopped and left the question silent. Severus nodded. He had no doubt remembered what Severus himself thought, that he was alert enough to all signs of danger to know when someone became a threat.

And he had Shield, who was now watching Yaxley with his teeth bared. In the last extreme, with Severus moving slowly, Shield would defend them both.

Severus commanded Yaxley to meet his eyes, and whispered the initial spell that would immerse himself in the man's mind the way he had not been since he first claimed his will and changed his Dark Mark. Wide swathes of dark, silvery-grey territory opened under him as if he had wings, and he stooped down on the first target.

* * *

As Severus had entrusted him to, Harry watched.

It was less difficult than he had expected it to be, actually. He didn't know that much about Legilimency, but he saw the way Severus's face relaxed, and the way that the hand clutching his wand stiffened, pointing it at Yaxley's eyes as if he were holding an instrument that would allow him to physically enter them. Then Severus leaned forwards and a small expression flitted over his face, his eyes, his lips, vanishing while Harry stared. He wasn't sure what it had been.

Shield rattled his wings and then wrapped them tightly around himself. Harry reached up to stroke him.

The scales under his fingers suddenly stood up on edge, and Shield hissed like the fire he could produce. Harry turned towards Yaxley and raised his own wand.

Yaxley took a step forwards, then halted before taking another, as though his feet had turned to stone. His hand fumbled at his side, and for a moment Harry had the hallucination that he was trying to wank. But then his fingers closed on his long wand, and Harry surged to his feet.

"Shield Severus!" he said aloud, and luckily Shield didn't act confused at the sound of his name used as a command. He flared forwards, extending his neck so that his head and one wing covered Severus's face, but his other wing and his tail remained in front of Harry. Harry thought he was finding more length in his body than it could possibly have.

But he couldn't worry about that right now. Harry faced Yaxley and raised a Shield Charm around Severus's legs.

Yaxley paused, and his lips moved. He seemed caught in a conversation with someone Harry couldn't see. Severus's wand jerked towards Yaxley's eyes, then stopped. Harry waited, looking back and forth between them. He didn't think he dared cast another spell until he knew what was going on.

Yaxley took a great, gasping breath, and then his eyes opened, and there was sanity and sense in them.

And rage.

Harry reinforced his Shield Charm right before Yaxley tried something Harry had never seen before, a chain of connected green lightning that rippled up and down like moving stairs and tried to crack the shield in the center. It _did _crack part of it, and Harry reinforced it again, and then moved off to the side, hoping that he could catch Yaxley's attention and distract him from Severus until Severus came out of the trance.

Yaxley turned towards him, and blinked, and smiled. He had jagged yellow teeth with large black gaps between them.

"Harry Potter," he whispered. "My Lord cannot reward me, but I will ensure that you pay for his destruction." And he repeated the stairstep spell, though this time it was yellow, and Harry had the sinking feeling that it would have a different, and probably much worse, effect.

Shield reared up in front of Harry, his tail swishing back and forth, his neck arching. Fire left his mouth, but it was silvery, and Harry didn't feel any of the heat he had during the attack in the Ministry. For a moment, the light of the fire blinded him; then he could blink and look again, and, at least if he was seeing right past the dancing afterimages, Yaxley's spell was completely gone.

Yaxley fell back a step, eyes narrowed. He either didn't care about Severus or knew he wasn't a threat right now.

"Perhaps you do have a true companion, then," he breathed. "That doesn't mean that I should not kill you, but it makes things different." He lowered his voice. "Master, can you hear me?"

Harry stared at him. He cleared his throat, and watched some sense and consciousness flutter back into Severus's face. He couldn't wait for him to recover completely, though, not if he was to question Yaxley with a completely free hand. Severus would want to direct the questions in a certain way, and that might be something that would go with Harry's desire to know more of what Yaxley was talking about, and might not.

"You mean the part of him that lived in me?" he whispered. "You mean that part, and the way it influenced me?"

Yaxley hesitated, as if deciding whether to answer, and then said, "Master, can _you _hear me?"

This time, the emphasis on the pronoun decided Harry. Yaxley probably didn't know about the Horcrux; instead, he seemed to think that some part of Voldemort survived in Harry, and that meant he should address that part and try to wake it up. And his wand was creeping stealthily over to the side in his wavering hand, as if he wanted to curse Harry from that direction and assumed Harry wouldn't notice.

Harry snapped up a Stunner, which hit Yaxley harder than he probably had anticipated because of how he was focusing on offense. Shield flew after him in the next moment and seized Yaxley's shoulders in his claws, yawning the silver fire into his face. Yaxley's wand fell as he slumped back, unconscious, and Shield seized it and flew back to Harry, tail coiling triumphantly through the air.

Harry accepted Shield's weight on his arm and petted his arched spine while he shook his head, confused. Did enough Death Eaters know about Voldemort's bid for immortality that they assumed he must have found some way to survive even the final death of his split soul? Or was Yaxley reaching for airy castles in his hope that Harry might contain part of that dark spirit?

Or was it some other idea, something he wasn't familiar with?

"I assumed that it would not go without problems when I felt him slip my mental net."

Harry turned. Severus was standing next to him, watching the fallen Yaxley with a faint distance still in his eyes, as though he was seeing whatever Yaxley's mental landscape had looked like to him. Harry opened his mouth to say something cutting, and then shook his head and let the mood drain away. Severus had only done this in the first place because Harry had insisted he should, and he was probably coping with the headache he had had after freeing Incognita.

"Yes," he said. "And he said something to me-he seemed to think that part of Old Snake-Face was still in me, that it had something to do with Shield."

Severus stared at him, and his hand rose for a moment as though he would cup Harry's face. Then he said, "Tell me exactly what he said. Quickly."

Harry froze his emotions, which wanted to involve him in panic, and simply repeated the words he'd heard Yaxley use. He'd had to do the same one time when one of Voldemort's wards had poisoned him and Hermione had to race to find the cure. What mattered were facts and what Severus could do with them, not his _feelings_. If Severus could use the information to save him, it would do more in the long term than screaming and flailing about.

When he finished, Severus turned to the fallen Yaxley and laughed. Harry relaxed. The sound had the rich, rolling tone of contempt he had heard the times Snape laughed at him for daring to think that he could accomplish a fancy potion without Hermione's help. He wouldn't do that if he thought Yaxley was a serious threat; he would laugh a different way.

_How do I know the different kinds of his laughter? Enough to tell the difference without him mentioning it? _

_ Because I do._

"It would be a complication if he had any basis for his theory," Severus said, and shook his head. "But he thinks that because the Dark Lord escaped death once, and because his companion was a snake and yours was a dragon, that there might be a chance that part of his Lord _does _live. But consider. You acquired Shield only recently. He did not appear with the slaughter of Nagini."

"Oh." Harry picked up the idea and examined it cautiously. It made almost _too _much sense, he thought, and it would be just his luck for Yaxley to turn out to be right. "Is there-any way that you can examine my mind and figure out whether any trace of _him_ is still there?"

"It would have shown up when I used Legilimency before." Severus frowned at him. "If a master vampire could not hide herself from me, neither could he."

"But he has experience with my mind that she doesn't," Harry felt like he had to argue. Didn't Snape remember their Occlumency lessons in fifth year and the way Voldemort had used his connection to Harry? "He could find some out of the way corner and stay there-"

"I do not think it likely," Snape said sharply, and Harry bit his lip and told himself to calm the fuck down. For a few moments, Snape watched him, forehead wrinkled, and Harry reminded himself to call him _Severus. _

"If it will ease your mind, however," Severus said, in much the same tone he had used to agree to freeing the Ashborn, "then I will examine you."

"Thank you," Harry breathed, and looked into Severus's eyes, trying, as hard as he could, to drop the barriers that might protect his thoughts. He knew it would hurt, but the pain was nothing compared to the pain of his deeper worry. Shield shifted on his shoulder, then seemed to decide Severus meant no harm and settled back into a crouch.

Severus muttered something under his breath and lifted his wand. Harry felt the magic strike into his mind and tried to relax.

* * *

It was, in Severus's opinion, an utterly ridiculous request. If the Dark Lord was still alive, their Marks would have recorded it. That was, in a way, a bond even deeper than Harry's curse scar, since the Death Eaters could only take it willingly, and the Dark Lord had commanded them through pain and power and twisted loyalty. The Marks would not have changed at the insistence of Severus's spell if the one who had placed them there was still alive, in any part.

But he had lifted his wand and cast the spell, and that alone told him he did not resent it as much as he had pretended. He would not have cast the spell for Harry if he was inclined to argue.

Or if it was not Harry.

Once again, he drifted into Harry's mind, but this time he saw it differently. Here and there were coiled fields laid out in the shapes of circles and spirals, glowing green as if in the midst of spring or gold as in autumn or white as in winter. Mountains still rose here and there, but Severus had the feeling that the black stone would slide aside if only he reached out and touched them.

He tested it, touching the nearest hill, and the rock blinked away from in front of him, revealing a misty memory. Severus shook his head, resisted the temptation to explore for exploration's sake, and turned around, raising his hands and casting a deeper version of the Legilimency spell, doing a variation of what he had done to free Yaxley's mind. There, he had needed to see all the bindings he had enacted, to make sure he did not forget any. Here, he called every memory of the Dark Lord forwards.

They resisted and rippled, but Severus did it anyway. Only because Harry was willing to cooperate with him could he command such a thing in a mind not his own. Willingness, and not will or discipline, held sway here.

The memories were there, and Severus caught glimpses of them from the corner of his eye as he lined them up and started to make them dance, but he refused to commit fully to any of them. Do so, and his own curiosity and the compelling quality that Harry's smallest gesture held might make him remain here until his own body collapsed of pain and exhaustion.

But he could lay the memories one over each other, like films of cloth, and then snap them up and down, like fabric hung on a clothesline. And he could see the darkness in each of them, a particular darkness that he stared at, looking for a solidity that would tell him the memories related to something independent in Harry's mind.

No such solidity appeared.

Severus gave a hard smile, waited until the memories fled his control and started back towards the deep places in Harry's mind, and then reached out and touched the nearest, gazing into it, as a reward for his own patience and diligence.

There was an explosion of dark fire, fanning out from a central point, and there was redness threaded through it, and the high, cold laughter that still had the effect of making Severus's spine press against his skin as though attempting to break through it. There was flying debris, and Severus thought he heard Nagini hiss somewhere in the background.

Then it was gone, and Severus felt a gentle but irresistible force propelling him out of Harry's mind. He blinked open his aching eyes and found Harry helping him into a chair with hands that held the same degree of gentleness.

"What was that?" he whispered.

"The memory of how I killed him," Harry said quietly. "I'm sorry, but I brought you out of it because I didn't think you wanted to get lost in it. Or that you wanted to know," he added, his voice sinking even further.

"Know how you killed him?" Severus put a hand on Harry's arm before he could withdraw the way he had withdrawn Severus from the memory and leaned closer to him still. "What does that mean?"

"That I killed him? That you confirmed he's dead and no longer there?" Harry smiled, but his eyes and smile were both unfocused. "Exactly what it sounds like. There's a reason that Ron didn't help Hermione and me study the spell, before the end. The spell, and the knowledge of it, does...certain things...to one's mind."

Severus opened his mouth to say that he could bear any knowledge, as he had borne for eighteen years the knowledge that he had caused his best friend's death-

And then looked more closely at Harry's face and shut his mouth after all.

"Thank you," he said instead.

Harry held his gaze, and his smile curved up. Severus reached out, to touch the back of his neck, and tilted him in. Harry only closed his eyes when their mouths met.

There was something thrilling and new about the kiss, but before Severus could analyze what it was, Harry pulled back and turned towards Yaxley. "What are we going to do about him?"

Severus told himself that disappointment, and trust, and exploration, could wait, and turned his mind towards the question.


	34. Making Apologies

Thank you again for all the reviews!

_Chapter Thirty-Four—Making Apologies_

"It is not surprising that Yaxley resented me for taking over his mind," Severus said, and lifted a cup of tea to his lips. Harry didn't think he was as interested in sipping it as he pretended. More interested in escaping the conversation they were about to have, Harry thought. "After all, I did not conceal the traces of my presence in pulling the bindings out, and he was inherently of a less resilient and forgiving temperament than Incognita."

Harry stared at his buttered scones and pushed them around on his plate. He really wasn't hungry, but Draco seemed to pick up on that thought even better than Severus, with his Legilimency, and turned to glare at him. Harry obediently picked up a scone and took a bite, although he didn't really think it would taste good.

The fluff of the bread melting on his tongue and the sweetness of the butter against the roof of his mouth convinced him otherwise, and he swallowed a few bites before he said, "I don't see how we can _know _which Ashborn would be good ones to release, though. If you can't know exactly how they'll react, and if their minds have changed while they were bound in any way, they might explode after you free them. Or not."

"That's why I don't see anything wrong with leaving some of them servants." Draco examined his plate as though displeased to find only crumbs there, and then leaned back in his chair and reached for one of the scones on Harry's plate. Harry slapped his wrist without thought. Draco gave him a smile that was all bright baring of his teeth. "They can serve a purpose that way, and we don't have to make difficult decisions about what to do with them."

"Not acceptable," Harry said quietly.

"I am willing to pay the price of giving the Ashborn up," Severus said a moment later, and put down his teacup. "I have already agreed to that. But I am interested in hearing what Harry thinks we should do with Yaxley."

"Yes, so am I." Draco linked his hands together and stretched his arms over his head, so far that Harry could hear the crackling of bones and muscles. Then he brought them down again, folded in front of him, and cocked his head at Harry. "And what we should do about the centaurs. They're beginning to talk of returning to the Forest. They don't feel they're truly part of the alliance, and I think they worry about what the werewolves may do without them there."

"They can't do anything about the werewolves by themselves," Harry said, blinking. "And you said that Thera did come with you to one conversation with Laughter."

Draco sighed and rolled his eyes. "Why do you think Thera and Kleianthe chose to come? They're the ones who _want _to be involved, Harry, to be on earth instead of gazing at the stars all the time. It's natural for them to resent being left out, whether it would make sense for them to be in the negotiations with Laughter or not."

Harry sighed and passed a hand over his eyes. He had spent most of last night worrying over what to do about Yaxley, and how he would apologize to the centaurs, and it was tempting to say, "Fuck it," and go back to bed. He couldn't think of anything immediately.

_That doesn't mean you need to say, "Fuck it." It only means that you need to think in more depth about what you have to do, and maybe blunder through it and make up the rules as you go along. You've done that all your life, why stop now?_

Harry gave a faint smile and dropped his hand to his lap. "I'm willing to take charge of Yaxley, if you want," he told Severus. "He seems to think that Vol—_he _is still alive in me. He might be willing to listen to me."

Severus's face did not change. "But I am not willing to let you be alone with him," he said. "He is still dangerous, and sooner or later he would find out that his delusion that part of the Dark Lord survives is indeed delusion. Think of something else."

Harry hesitated. Then he said, "I can't think of something else. Killing him would be cruel. Trying to force him to obey us or putting him back under slavery now that he's had some time out of it is cruel. Keeping him captive is dangerous and useless. Stripping him of his magic or _Obliviating _him is cruel."

"Is that all you can think of?" Severus raised his eyebrows, and his cup, again. "I thought of turning him over to the Ministry. Let their justice take its course. He is a Death Eater, and but for my taking over their remnants, the Ministry would have caught and punished him in any case. Give him to them. It could be a good peace offering, and a reassurance to them that we will obey the letter of the law."

"That's," Harry began, and then stopped. It did seem like a good solution, but that was his whirling head talking, surely.

"I don't think we should sacrifice someone's life simply because we can't figure out what to do with him," he said at last.

Severus shook his head, and he had a smile on his face to match Draco's. "Do we know they will kill him? They may simply put him in Azkaban, or try him for lesser crimes and fine him; I do not know how much detail they have about Yaxley's specific actions during the war. And my responsibility towards him ended when I released him from his bindings. If I am not his Lord and he is not my servant, I have no responsibilities towards him."

"It just seems a miserable life," Harry said. "Being a Death Eater, being enslaved, being a prisoner."

Draco leaned forwards and stared hard into his face. "Harder than what I endured?" he asked. "As a young Death Eater, and a torturer, and a prisoner, and then someone who might have wasted my life if you hadn't come along? Harder than Severus's years as a spy and a Death Eater and a shut-away Lord of the Ashborn? Harder than what _you _did?"

Harry leaned back and shut his eyes again. Draco and Severus let him. In a moment, Harry heard the sound of Draco eating again from some newly-summoned dish, and the murmur of low conversation as he and Severus spoke to each other.

_If they think I'm being stupid…_

_ It might be worth listening to them._

Harry had to admit that he really didn't know what to do with Yaxley if not hand the man over to the Ministry. Yaxley couldn't be trusted, and the time spent to redeem him or make him listen or establish a truce that would hold with him was time that Harry could better spend on soothing other Ashborn, like Incognita, who would listen to him and not cause Severus so much time and trouble to release.

He remembered what Draco had said when they'd spoken about it, that neither he nor Severus cared about the Ashborn in the way that Harry wanted them to. They didn't see them as people who should have their own independent minds and lives, because when they had those minds and lives, they had used them to make Draco and Severus miserable. Or they had, at the very least, gone along with Voldemort's plans to do so and hadn't dared to speak up.

If these Death Eaters came out of their slavery and couldn't see the advantage of staying quiet and trying to find a way to live, like Incognita, then why should Draco and Severus waste extra time on them?

Harry explored the edges of a new, curious idea, his tongue tapping around it like a loose tooth. _Maybe…maybe I don't have to care about them either, if I don't want to. Perhaps neither Draco nor Severus would care if they went into the Ministry's custody, and I could stop worrying about them that way._

_ Maybe I can be selfish sometimes. Who would thank me for caring about the Ashborn? Not them, not when I'm only the man who killed their Lord to the ones like Yaxley. Not Ron and Hermione and the other Weasleys, not when they have the world to worry about putting back together after the war. Not Draco and Severus._

Harry opened his eyes and looked at Draco, who looked back at him with one eyebrow raised and his mouth full, and Severus, who patted at his lips with a napkin and leaned back in his chair.

"Trying to be selfish feels strange," he said.

"That's because you've learned to think of it _as _selfishness," Draco said, and took another sip of tea. "Try thinking of it as the normal bloody way that everyone behaves, and it'll come more naturally to you."

"It's true that I can't think of anything else to do for them," Harry admitted. "And that I would rather help people who can be helped than spend my time and effort on someone who wouldn't appreciate them anyway." Perhaps he could think of Yaxley rather like some people in the Ministry, who wouldn't be content with Harry as a hero unless he perfectly obeyed them. Neither was worth a thought.

"I knew you would learn it someday," Draco said, and put his cup down to applaud politely. Severus didn't follow his lead, but _did _look vastly amused. "It's common sense, and most other people in the world are born with it. But you, you had to learn the high-level morality first, and approach everything backwards."

Harry threw his napkin at him. Draco caught it with a little cluck of his tongue and smiled at Harry. "You look a lot better without all that darkness in your eyes," he murmured.

"And I should care how you think I look?" Harry shook his head and grinned. He hadn't realized how much his inability to think of a solution for the Yaxley problem had weighed him down. It felt as if he might run up mountains like a goat right now and still have enough energy for a dance or a duel afterwards.

"That _is _rather the idea when you are considering taking someone as a lover, yes," Severus said, his voice even lower and smoother than Draco's.

Harry blinked, and the silence filled the air between them like smoke. He thought it was the first time that one of them had said, out loud, what had hovered between them and whispered in their touches and kisses.

And it was _still _odd, to think about kissing them. Harry thought he had plenty of Gryffindor morality left, it just concentrated in queer places.

He stood up and glanced at Draco. "Would you mind taking me to the centaurs' garden?" he asked, picking up an orange from a plate in the center of the table that the Ashborn must have brought while his eyes were closed. "I think I have a peace offering to try and make."

Draco raised an eyebrow at him. "You know it won't be that simple? They've had plenty of fruit by now, and they're still going to remember your broken promise, not forget it because you're offering them something sweet."

"This is a symbol, not a bribe," Harry said patiently, and reflected that he wasn't the only one who could misunderstand basic gestures sometimes. "And, Severus, is there something you could do to figure out which Ashborn are safe to free and which aren't? I'd rather not put you through that pain again for nothing."

"Perhaps a potion, yes," Severus said, and his fingers twitched as if he would pick up a quill. "There are certain herbs that are useful in constructing images of the mind even for a non-Legilimens…yes…"

Harry turned away, smiling, and found Draco watching him thoughtfully from beside his chair. Harry nodded to him. "Ready?"

* * *

Draco shut the gate of the garden behind them and watched as Harry approached Thera and Kleianthe, holding the oranges he'd stolen from the table high.

Well, not _stolen_. But Harry moved as if he had stolen them, and Draco could see the centaurs watching him and deciphering how he felt from the way his arm was crooked and his slightly desperate smile.

Draco strolled after him, meeting Thera's eyes and smiling blandly when she glanced at him. It wasn't _his _fault if the centaurs found Harry confusing to deal with. Draco was sure he would, too, in their place. But they would have to choose on their own to reject or accept his apology. Draco wouldn't interfere.

Kleianthe was the first one who moved in response to Harry's overtures, stopping in front of him and drumming one hoof on the ground. Harry's shoulders stiffened, which made Draco wonder what he associated that sound with, but he bowed and held out the oranges. Kleianthe picked up the nearest one and held it to her mouth, squeezing the juice onto her tongue. Her gaze never moved from Harry's face.

Thera was the one who held out a hand but kept it poised in the air, meaning that Harry had to move closer to her if he wanted to give her anything. She kept her voice mild, but for all that, it was an effective whip and Draco saw Harry flinch underneath it. "You broke your promise to us."

"Yeah, I did," Harry said. He seemed to have chosen simple words, along with simple gifts. "Sorry."

"Why should we trust you to come back now?" Kleianthe danced in place, hooves thudding into the dirt. Harry turned his head back to her, face remote, and Draco was sure that he was controlling a magical reaction that otherwise might have been much worse than this. Kleianthe wouldn't necessarily know that, though, and the way she reared and came down in front of him said she wasn't impressed. "You made a solemn promise that you then broke. You can't tell me that you're sorry for it now."

"Because you won't accept the apology?" Harry watched her, but kept his hand with the other orange aimed towards Thera. After a few moments, she took it and began to peel it. Her gaze stayed on Harry, more meditative than anything.

"Because you aren't sorry," Kleianthe said. "If you cared enough to be sorry, then you would never have broken your word in the first place."

"That's rather circular logic, isn't it?" Harry said, with a smile that Draco couldn't help but appreciate, even if he agreed with Kleianthe that Harry should have thought more about his original promise before he made it. "That would deny that anyone ever changes or makes apologies."

"I distrust your reasoning, as well." Kleianthe dropped the part of the orange she held to the ground and pulped it with slow, strong motions of her hooves. Draco didn't think her eyes, focused on Harry's, had blinked yet.

"Someone so unyielding would make a bad diplomat," Harry said. "Therefore, I don't think your leader sent you with that in mind, or else you don't really believe what you're saying. There must be something I can do to make it up to you."

"Presuming that you can makes your arrogance obvious," Thera said, and Harry flinched as though someone had slapped him.

He turned to face her, and then took a deep breath and bowed his head. "And now I'm sorry for _that_," he murmured. "This does seem to be a morning for making apologies. All right. Is there anything I can do that would make you accept me back?"

Thera smiled and bounced the orange in her hand, then took another bite. "If you made a promise you could not break," she said.

"I didn't know centaurs could make Unbreakable Vows," Harry said. Draco touched his elbow to get his attention, and shook his head. There were harmonics ringing in the back of Harry's voice that worried him. _All _they needed now was for Harry to break out and do something to the centaurs.

"We cannot," said Thera. "Or rather, we have no desire to involve ourselves in such promises. We would rather that you swear on your magic, so that if you break the oath, you will not die, but your magic will be diminished."

Harry blinked and looked at Draco. "You can _do _that? I never heard of something like that."

"Why are you looking at me as if I'm the only one you can trust to tell you the truth, simply because I'm a wizard?" Draco murmured, and took the back of Harry's neck in one hand, aiming Harry's head at Thera. "She's the one you should listen to, because she's the one who's telling you the truth right now. Are you going to listen to her or not?"

Harry flushed and mumbled, and then stood up. "Okay. I never heard of something like that before. How can you make such a promise hold?"

"It all depends on the way you make it." It was Kleianthe who took up the conversation now. She had a leaf in her hands and was deliberately ripping it, but at least she had blinked. Draco thought he was seeing now why both Thera and Kleianthe had come, and how they might work in concert when confronting different types of humans. "Will you speak the correct words, knowing that you will be punished for your disloyalty and your word falsely given, and that there is no second chance if you fail this time?"

"More like a third chance," Harry murmured, but he nodded. "Yes. If the promise only harms myself and no one else."

"We have no interest in such things," Thera repeated, her voice lofty. She reached out and picked up an apple from a plate in front of her, then broke it in two halves with a twist of her hands that Draco would have given a lot to be able to imitate. He avoided eating fruit often simply because it ended up so messy. "Mr. Malfoy, will you take one half of this apple and be a Bearer for this rite?"

_A Bearer must be like a Bonder. _Draco reached out and picked up the apple half, holding it in front of him. He could see a star-shaped pattern of seeds on the white flesh, and wondered what Thera was going to do with it. This must be centaur magic, which he had heard of but thought confined to reading the stars.

Thera turned to face Kleianthe, and held out the other half of the apple. Kleianthe took it and backed up so that she stood across from Thera. With her eyes and a nod of her head, Thera directed Draco to move so that he was standing across from Harry, leaving Harry and Thera in the middle. Harry had his hands clenched in front of him, but didn't object.

"Now," Thera said, and her voice had gained a strange, strong resonance that actually made Draco glad that he wasn't expected to do anything but hold the apple, "do you, Harry Potter, swear to support us as your allies, fight for us, and not run away again?"

Harry waited as if to hear more, and then nodded cautiously. Draco began to relax. Perhaps this promise would go well after all. Those were practically things that Harry did all the time anyway.

Thera gave him a faint smile and stepped back so that she was closer to Kleianthe, motioning Harry to move closer to Draco at the same time. "Do you swear on your magic to keep these promises? You must speak aloud."

Harry blew out his breath, and then said, "Yes. I swear on my magic to support you as my allies, fight for you, and not run away again."

Draco felt a fierce hum start in his hand, affecting the apple but seeming to travel down into the bones and the skin of his wrist. He gritted his teeth and held on. He didn't know exactly what the centaur magic entailed, but he doubted Thera would do something that would hurt him or Harry. She had to know that that was counterproductive as far as making the alliance strong went.

Thera nodded twice, once as though in response to Harry and once as though listening to silent instructions. "Very well," she said. "You know what you have sworn, and you will be punished if you forsake it."

"I will be," Harry said, and then blinked, as if he hadn't exactly meant to say that.

Kleianthe curled her fingers around her half of the apple. Draco could see it vibrating, dancing, trying to get away from her. He didn't think his own was doing that, but he curled his fingers around it, too, in case it started to happen.

"You should take the magic into you, make it part of your body," Thera said, and her voice was low and lulling. Draco reached up with his free hand to smooth the hair down on the back of his neck, and tried to remind himself that Thera wouldn't want to harm Harry, either. Harry reached out for the half of the apple that Draco held, not taking his gaze from Thera, and Thera reached for Kleianthe's half in the same way.

Draco tried to make sure that he released the apple he held at the same moment Kleianthe released hers. Kleianthe met his eyes and smiled a little, stamping down with one hoof.

_That must be right, then. _Draco felt himself relax a fraction. He still didn't understand much about the strange diplomatic waters that he was swimming in, but he kept getting things right.

Harry bit into the apple, and grimaced, as though the magic had made it taste strange. But he ate it all, and so did Thera. They even licked their fingers free of juice in almost an identical manner. That was the only part Draco had to look away from, because he was sure the sight wasn't meant to make his groin hum and twitch the way the apple had done, either.

"Good," Thera said, when they were done. She stamped her hoof again, and nodded. "Now, you can go. We will need time to consider the offer you have made us, and that we may be able to forgive you."

Harry blinked, as though he had thought instant forgiveness was possible—after everything, after all—but inclined his head, and then turned and walked out of the garden. Draco lingered to watch Thera. She had started to lower her head as though to crop grass, the way Kleianthe had already done, but cocked it to watch him.

"Is something wrong?" she asked politely.

"I'm glad that you made the decision to take him back into the alliance," Draco said. "I can't promise that he'll be perfect, but he does want to help."

Thera snorted, the sound more human-like than horse-like, although the light shudder of her skin she gave a moment later had no human equivalent that Draco could think of. "That was the nature of the old alliance, as well. It had to be flexible, because it had to embody new mistakes, and old ones, and room for people to make them and be forgiven. We will accept him as long as he does not break his promise, and that is less likely now."

Draco bit back the words that he wanted to speak, about how Harry was so powerful that losing some of his magic probably wouldn't mean as much to him as the loss of all their magic might mean to most people. He was here to help Harry and include him as part of the alliance, and that meant trying to refrain from automatically tearing him down.

_That is hard to remember, sometimes._

"I hope that you're right," he said, and left the garden to go after Harry.

* * *

Severus stared into the crystal bowl in front of him, and then leaned back and shut his eyes. Thoughts whirled and dashed through his head, fragments of books and his own notions about experimental brews and the time that it would probably take to construct a potion like this, one that would let him see the thoughts of his Ashborn and the underlying structures of their minds before he freed them.

_If I use hawthorn…comfrey would work better…potions involving memories are always tricky…one cannot use Legilimency if there is no mind to read…there would be a mind if I were to retain the potion as an inert base and only brew it to work when those memories are added…_

He opened his eyes and bent once more over the dish, his fingers twitching. He blew across the mixture he had already put in there, and then waited. The impulse to blow had been a strange one, but sometimes his best results came out of the strangest impulses.

The crystal dish twanged like a beaten tuning fork, and then the liquid inside surged up towards his face. It resembled the silver liquid of memories in a Pensieve, but was both thicker and more sluggish. Severus rapped his wand sharply against the side of the dish, and the liquid settled back with what sounded like a hiss. Severus let his lip twitch, once.

_Good. _It would do if it was working right, at this point in the process, and what better way to test it than with one of his own memories?

He touched his wand to his temple and thought of his last kiss with Harry. The memory flowed out and draped itself as a slender silver thread over the wand, so that Severus rather had to work to get it into the dish.

But once it settled into the mixture of molten silver, hawthorn leaves, and several other ingredients that Severus had written down on the parchment beside him, everything changed. A spiderweb of cracks spread out over the surface, and Severus found himself gazing at something that looked like broken ice. He smiled and tapped the dish with his wand again.

The potion rose and twisted itself into an ice sculpture of a branch, with shadows moving inside it. Severus gazed at the shadows, and discovered the first of the problems that he would have with this particular experiment.

The shadows needed interpretation. They did not form straightforward pictures, but simple images, ones that sketched and sawed back and forth as though they were cast by a fire. Severus knew what memory he had put into the dish, and that would help in this initial interpretation, but it would take much more practice for the others.

Severus grimaced for a moment. Harry, with his insistence that the Ashborn be freed as soon as possible, would not like that.

Then Severus settled back in his chair and shook his head. Harry had shown that he was more willing to accommodate Draco and Severus than he had initially seemed to be. So Severus would explain the problem and show that he had tried to solve it, but that more time was necessary.

And in the meantime, Harry should grow more reconciled to the idea that not everything would happen the moment he wanted it to, and that some of the Ashborn perhaps could not be freed at all.

Severus smiled and reached for his wand again.

* * *

"I'm _sorry_," Harry said, shifting so that Shield's weight was somewhat better balanced on his shoulder and the sharp tail wasn't poking him in the nostrils from its tight clutch around his neck. "But you can't be with me all the time. I didn't want you there at breakfast hissing at Draco and Severus for disagreeing with me, and I didn't want you in the garden where you might threaten the centaurs."

The dragon hissed into his ear and hooked his claws ever deeper, so that Harry thought there was a good chance he would probably get his chest scratched if someone knocked on the door and startled either of them. He reached up and caught Shield's foot, intending to remove the claws from his shirt altogether.

Shield craned his neck around and cried into his face.

Harry stopped, staring at him. Shield bobbed his head up and down in response, and then tucked his neck around Harry's, along with his tail. He must have lengthened it, because his eyes wound up next to Harry's cheek, and stared at him, claws tightening until Harry thought he'd have better luck removing his own hands than Shield.

"I'm sorry," Harry said quietly. "I didn't realize that it meant that much to you."

He sat down on the bed, cradling Shield against him. The dragon waited a moment, as though absorbing Harry's intentions and deciding that he didn't really want to run away from him, and then unwound. He ended up on Harry's lap, running his claws delicately over his shirt this time and crooning up at him.

Harry shook his head and rubbed Shield's back. "You're still anxious about the Ministry attack?" he asked. "But you have to get used to that. I don't think I'll ever be completely safe. Even if I'm safe for most of my life, someone else will probably try to kill me. That's just the way things are."

Shield bared his teeth and snapped them. Harry touched his back again, smoothing down the spine.

"Because I used to be the Chosen One, and because the Ministry dislikes me, or some people in it do, and because there are people who might still think Voldemort should have won out there," Harry said. "That's why."

Shield drummed his tail against Harry's chest, and, of course, said nothing. But the look in his eyes deepened, and Harry sighed and stroked his head again.

"I'm not going to run _actively _into danger," he said. "But that doesn't mean I'll be able to stay out of it completely and for the rest of my life, especially when I'm not going to squat in the fortress for the rest of my life, either. You can come with me, and guard me. Just not all the time. And you'll have to get used to the danger."

Shield bared his diamond-edged teeth. Harry stroked his neck and tried to think about it, about the ways that he could keep himself safe enough for his paranoid dragon companion while still having enough of a life to be worthwhile.

_Well. Maybe just thinking about it in the beginning would be enough. Not rushing into danger when I don't have to. Not doing things like accepting the Ministry's invitation when I don't know what it'll entail._

Shield crooned and loosened his hold on Harry's shirt, probably because he could pick up on the direction of his thoughts. Harry was starting to stroke down his leg when someone knocked on his door.

"Come in," he called. There was one good thing about being in the Ashborn fortress, at least, he thought, as he transferred Shield to his shoulder: he never had to worry about someone who didn't belong there knocking on his door. If it wasn't Draco or Severus, it would be Bellatrix or another of the Ashborn with Severus's mind behind their eyes.

_You oughtn't to feel that way. You ought to feel that the Ashborn would be better off free._

Harry was so busy arguing with himself about that that at first he didn't notice Draco standing in the doorway. Then he raised his head, and hoped he didn't look too stupid with the focus he'd had on his own thoughts, and said, "Yes?"

Draco smiled at him, a smile so slow that Harry braced himself for insults to come behind it, and shut the door. Then he took a step forwards and said, casually, "I find that I'd like to kiss you. And that I'd like to spend some time with Severus while we do it." He looked at Shield for a moment, no more than a flicker of his eyelids, but it was enough to let Harry know what he would say next. "Without the dragon. What do you say?"

His gaze came back to Harry's, and the very intensity told Harry that Draco wasn't sure what he would say next, apparent confidence or not.

Harry swallowed. His hands shook, and he closed them into fists and hoped they would shake in a more productive manner. Shield glanced back and forth from him to Draco, but made no vocal objection, the way Harry had thought he would.

"I—I'd like that," he said, and his voice cracked and then broke, something that shouldn't have been possible in only three words. Draco nodded, his smile gone and his eyes left with that burning light.

"Good. I think Severus will have finished his work for the day in, perhaps, an hour or two. Come to the rooms that we share." And Draco stepped out of the bedroom and closed the door behind him, leaving Harry blinking and Shield sitting upright on his haunches, twining his neck around Harry's again.

"I didn't know Slytherins made appointments for sex," Harry told Shield, smoothing his hand up and down the dragon's back again.

Shield looked at him with clear eyes and gave a small, uncertain chirp.

"Yeah," Harry said, and flopped back on the pillow, the whirling thoughts about danger and dragons and selfishness and safety replaced by smaller but no less confusing ones about Draco and Severus. "You and me both."


	35. Forward Momentum

Thank you again for all the reviews!

_Chapter Thirty-Five—Forward Momentum_

Harry came stepping into the room like a nervous deer.

Severus placed the potions vial he'd been holding carefully on the shelf beside him and turned around. He wasn't sure what his face should look like, peaceful or welcoming or neutral or lustful, so he let it fall into whatever lines it always did when he wasn't thinking about it. The fire was large, at least, and the bed was comfortable, with the covers turned back. Harry saw it and his eyes widened to the point that Severus really believed he would bolt back out the door.

Then Draco came in behind him and shut and locked the door, leaning against it with a smile when Harry spun around and glared at him. Severus smiled. Draco understood Harry, it was clear. When he faced Severus again, his face was more flushed, but his breathing less heavy, and the fear gone entirely. Place him in a situation where he faced opposition, and Harry found his courage.

"Would you like to sit down?" Severus asked, the way he would with any guest in the rooms where he and Draco had been the only people for so long. "Would you like something to drink?" He eyed the carafe of wine on the table and wondered if he should have ordered Bellatrix to bring something else. Then again, it was only since his return from the Weasleys' that Harry had begun to eat with them, and few of those meals had included alcohol of any kind. Severus realized, with a shock that seemed to ring within him, that he had no idea what Harry drank.

He looked forward to finding out.

"No," Harry said. "I don't need _liquid _courage." He shot a glance over his shoulder at Draco, as if he wanted to make sure Draco knew that too.

Draco had started to remove his shirt, and Harry's mouth stuck halfway open. Severus had to admit that it was worth a stare. The only remaining sign of Draco's imprisonment was his extremely pale skin, which more than a few hours in the sun had not cured. And, of course, the changed Dark Mark on his arm, but as that was the rising dark phoenix now, Severus was not inclined to count it.

Draco glanced at Harry and smiled, then stretched his arms back and lounged his way into the chair facing Severus's so Harry could get a good look. "I bet I have more muscles than you do," he murmured.

"You do _not_," Harry said, but his eyes were stuck on Draco's chest, the lean muscles that indeed comprised it, the way the skin lingered tight around the ribs, and his voice lacked conviction.

"Well, there's only one way for us to judge for ourselves, isn't there?" Draco let his eyelashes droop, and then rise again as he stared at Harry. Severus felt his smile threatening to spread out of control. He could not remember, the last time he fucked Draco, that the boy had had such confidence. Harry's sojourn here had been good for all of them, in multiple ways.

The breath was stuck in Harry's throat as his jaw was stuck open, but he began to yank at his shirt anyway. Severus stood up and moved behind him, and Harry's head snapped around immediately, his breath hushed and his shoulders bristling with tension. There stood the experienced warrior, Severus thought, who was attentive to the smallest sounds because anything he didn't notice might mean the end.

"Let me help you," Severus breathed into Harry's ear, and poised his hands over Harry's buttons, waiting for him.

Harry paused, thinking. Then he tilted his head back, and seemed to _visibly _relax, pouring calmness and lack of tension down his spine and arms. He held up those arms and gave Severus a smile that couldn't have been more wide and loose if he _had _been drinking wine. "I think I will. Thank you."

Severus wondered if Harry knew that he became more formal in pursuit of sex, but now wasn't the time to ask. He nuzzled his way down Harry's shoulder instead, his fingers flicking through buttons just fast enough to make Harry's breath speed up. Harry shifted against him, and moaned.

"Let me help, too."

Draco stood up and then fell to his knees in front of Harry, managing to make it all look like part of the same graceful motion. He looked up at them, and winked. Severus thought the wink was meant more for him than Harry, who probably wouldn't appreciate it, but then Harry's eyes were shut as his neck strained back, and it was hard to say what he noticed and what he didn't.

Draco slid Harry's trousers down his legs, pausing now and then to apparently loosen the cloth from a hair. Severus, watching the way that Draco's nails scratched and scraped at Harry's legs, doubted that Harry had _that _much hair to catch.

Harry began to twist in their grasp, his hands reaching out to rest on top of Severus's, then gliding down over Draco's hair. Severus bent his head to fasten his teeth on the side of Harry's neck at the same time as Draco pulled his head back and clucked his tongue.

"You don't have to do that, Harry," Draco said. "At least, not yet. You don't need to worry about it. Let us do all the work." He licked the side of Harry's hipbone and then pushed gently at his feet, until he lifted them and let Draco work the trousers over his ankles.

Severus looked down, balancing himself with one hand against Harry's shoulder. His mind was filled with heady mist that made him feel as if he might fall over at any moment.

Harry's legs were leaner than he had thought they would be; then again, the baggy clothes he often wore did him no favors in the department of looks. Muscles marked them, and scars. Severus found himself reaching down towards a long one that cut from Harry's hip, under his pants, towards his left thigh, and then faded abruptly before it managed to reach that far.

Harry caught his hand before it could reach the scar, and gasped, his eyes flaring open. "Not that one," he said. "Don't touch it."

Severus froze before he could stop himself. He wondered what might have caused the scar. It looked too thin for a bite. A knife scar, perhaps? One that had not knitted closed properly, perhaps because no one with Harry had had dittany…

"Why?" Draco was the one who asked, lifting his head from where he'd been staring greedily at Harry's groin. Severus caught his eye and frowned, but Draco lofted his eyebrows at him and shook his head, and Severus knew he was going to lose this battle. "Is it still painful to you when someone touches it?"

Harry gulped air for a moment. The vivid flush ran all the way down his chest, and Severus saw more scars there. He frowned, his passion guttering for a moment. Harry looked as though he was twice his age in terms of fighting experience. He was, in truth, surprised that nothing had made Harry stop them before now, as being held close with teeth on his neck could be expected to remind him of bad experiences.

"I—it's sensitive," Harry said, and grimaced. "Even my jeans brushing over it right after I first got it made it ache. I had to cast spells to hold the cloth away from the skin."

Severus didn't think Harry was in the right place to see the unholy grin break out over Draco's face, but he was.

"Draco," he whispered warningly.

"It's sensitive," Draco said, and reached out, his fingers lingering in mid-air for a moment. "Has it got any less sensitive as the years go by?" His voice was calm, but his eyes _shone_, and his fingers poised and then inched nearer, poised and then inched.

"Not really," Harry said. "I mean, it doesn't react to my clothes now, but anything new touching it, anything that I don't—"

Draco reached out and skimmed his fingers down the scar in a single, fast motion that Severus wasn't sure he could have prevented even if he had already begun to move.

Harry gasped. His head tossed back, his feet drummed on the floor, and his leg kicked out. Draco wasn't in the way because he had planned well enough not to be, but he was back a moment later, his fingernails digging into the scar, his tongue dragging along it.

Harry moaned, and flushed all over, his glasses slipping down his face. Severus honestly believed he would have melted to the ground if not for the cradling hold of Severus's arms. Severus brought him closer, and felt a flash of heat not unlike the kind that was devouring Harry. _He _was the one holding Harry up while he experienced the most intense sensations of his life, it looked like.

Perhaps he could let some of the fears go. Harry had powerful magic. He would fling them away from him if they did something that he couldn't handle. Severus sank his fingers in above Harry's hipbones, and Harry moaned again and spread his legs. Severus slid his fingers below the back of Harry's pants, onto his arse, and Harry jumped and moaned.

"Harry," Draco whispered, brushing the damp spot on Harry's pants and his inner thighs with his hair now. "Are you a virgin?"

Severus was startled at the heat that convulsed through him—and then he wasn't, remembering that he had asked Draco the same question once. And Harry had gone silent and still under their hands, but not in a rejecting way.

"I also find myself interested in the answer to that question," Severus murmured, and relinquished the closer contact with Harry in order to begin shedding his clothes. As good as touching Harry's skin with his bare hands was, he suspected it might feel even better with bare chests.

* * *

Harry was shivering. He didn't know what was wrong with him. It certainly wasn't _cold, _not when there was an enormous fire going in the hearth and two men so close to him that he could feel the gust of the breaths from their mouths.

But he shivered anyway, and it was—

It was like the shivers when Draco had touched his scar. (And Harry had _told _him, but of course Draco, the twat, had insisted on going ahead and doing it anyway). He couldn't _help _it. Someone asking him if he was a virgin, in _that _voice…Harry suddenly thought he had been waiting most of his life to hear the question.

But he had also thought that the only person who'd be asking him that was Ginny.

_Things change._

He opened his eyes. Draco knelt on the floor in front of him, waiting for his answer. His eyes were luminous with the light; Harry hadn't realized that grey eyes could look that way. Behind him, he could hear buttons tearing through cloth, and his mouth ran with water, and he nodded without meaning to.

"Yes," he whispered.

Draco surged to his feet and slammed his mouth into Harry's. His mouth tasted more metallic than Severus's, and his breath was hotter and fiercer, and he bore Harry back and down now that Severus wasn't there to hold him up anymore. Harry shifted, already trying to relax his muscles for the fall, sad that he couldn't keep his entire concentration on the kiss.

But Draco turned them as they fell, and then they were on the bed, bouncing, Draco laughing breathlessly above Harry as he broke their kiss for a moment.

"You should have seen—you really thought that I was going to let you fall, didn't you? You thought we would do that to you—you thought we would—"

Harry seized Draco's shoulders and rolled on top of him, grinding his length down into Draco's, satisfied when Draco shut up and gasped and blinked. Then he dived down in turn, and it was his turn to kiss until his tongue was stuffed deep and Draco's eyes were crossing with it.

He felt someone behind him, and turned his head without relaxing the hold of his arms and legs that kept Draco pinned to the bed. He kissed Severus, used his tongue and lips and teeth in the ways that felt really good until he could feel Severus's moan vibrating up his throat. He couldn't hear it, they were so close. That didn't matter.

Nothing mattered, except what they wanted to.

And with that realization, Harry felt as if he were flying, and he relaxed the controls, _all _of them, the steel coils in his soul, and let his magic out.

It started with a low, resonant hum that made the walls of Severus and Draco's quarters shake around them, and then Harry felt the bed take it up, not quite a singer but a song, the wooden frame and the pillows all subtly dancing to it. Harry held his breath, but didn't clamp the controls back down again, instead waiting to see what Draco and Severus would do.

Draco pushed himself up on one elbow and stared down at Harry in breathless wonder, his eyebrows cocked. Harry took a deep breath and pulled him down for a kiss. He could feel the hum coming from his mouth now, making his teeth buzz.

"That's _you_," Draco breathed, leaving less than an inch of space between their mouths. "You—you can do that—you can—I never knew—" His fingers descended, wove themselves restlessly through Harry's hair, and _tugged. _Harry tipped his head back in compliance, sighing as Draco kissed him nearly senseless.

"That is him indeed."

Harry started. Severus had fallen to the bed beside them and had one hand outstretched, watching Harry as though waiting for his permission to touch his hip. Harry shivered as he took Severus in—lean muscles, scars, hands that still moved with the delicate precision necessary to a Potions master even though he wasn't in the lab right now—and nodded.

Severus's hand was on his hip before he saw it move, his thumb smoothing up and down. Harry closed his eyes and felt his bones respond, hissing and settling in their sockets, flexing as much as they were able.

"You don't have to fear."

Harry cracked open one eye, to study Draco, hovering above him. "Well, I_ wasn't _afraid, but now you have me thinking that way," he sniped. "What was it that you didn't want me to be afraid of?"

"This is part of the reason that you're still a virgin, isn't it?" Draco gestured up and down his body, eyes so intense that Harry stared at them instead of the rest of Draco, which he really wanted to look at. "Because you were afraid of what might happen if you lost control of your magic in the heat of passion."

"_The heat of passion?"_ Harry repeated in disgust. "Are you listening to yourself?" And he hooked an arm around Draco and dragged him down.

Draco squawked like an indignant chicken, but Harry shut him up with another kiss, and kept kissing him until Draco was drooping and boneless above him, panting and bright-eyed. Then Harry licked at his lips and Draco sighed and opened his mouth, and their tongues tangled together with a slowness that made Harry arch his hips in pure frustration.

A third tongue came in from the side, and Harry turned his head to welcome Severus. His mouth tasted different than Draco's, more metallic, as if the time he spent around potions made him have to swallow the fumes. Then Severus pushed Harry gently down and to the side, and reached up to seize the back of Draco's neck in his hands, dragging him nearer so that he could kiss him, and kiss him, and kiss him.

Harry lay back on the pillow and frankly stared. He had never seen two people kissing like this, kissing for him to watch; Ron and Hermione had always tried to arrange for some privacy on the Horcrux hunt when they absolutely had to snog. And this was different for him anyway. He had known Ron and Hermione so long that it was difficult for him to see them as sexual.

But Severus, with his black hair hanging down like a slash of ink, and Draco with his eyes bright and his hair mussed and his tongue reaching the longer distance to tangle with Severus's as it retreated, and the way that they knelt on either side of his body and Harry could reach up and slide his hands down their shoulders and their chests…

Fuck, he was hard and aching and they'd barely _touched _him yet. And the magic went on flooding out of him, so that sparks of lazy red light drifted above his lovers' heads, and Harry felt his nipples stand straight up in response, and he started to flip over so that he could rut against the covers, the image of the kiss burning bright in his mind.

Severus stopped him, Vanished his pants, and bent down without ceremony to seize Harry's cock in his mouth.

Harry bucked and squawked in turn, and saw Draco sprawl beside him, mouth open in something that might have been and better not be laughter, his trousers gone and his hand so busy on his own cock that Harry thought he would come before anyone else could touch him. He took his hand off a moment later, at Severus's murmured command, and simply watched. Harry had never known what it was like to feel devoured by a gaze.

Now he knew.

And he knew what it was like to be devoured by a mouth, too, the sliding wet heat, the tongue that looped around the head of his shaft and held him captive there, the hands that pinned him down when he tried to get closer. Harry pleaded and moaned anyway, although he knew Severus wouldn't let him go, and the air was _dazzling _with the light and the music of his magic.

But neither of them made fun of that. Oh, now and then Draco lifted one hand to cup the air, his eyes bright and curious, and now and then Severus seemed to choke as the rhythm of the magic Harry was spreading probably traveled up his cock, but neither of them pulled away.

He didn't have to be self-conscious with them, not if he didn't want to.

Although Severus's sucking wasn't leaving him much room to move, Harry still managed to roll to the side and put his hand on Draco's cock. Draco gasped and looked down at him, grey eyes bright with more of that wonder.

Harry smiled at him, and opened his mouth.

Draco got the idea soon enough, bright little thing that he was, squirming down the bed and arching his hips so Harry could get his mouth into position. Harry wondered for just a second before Draco came to rest on his tongue what it would be like. Would it taste so bad that he couldn't suck? Would Draco fuck his face the way that Severus was preventing Harry from doing to him? Would—

Then it was there, and the length, more than the taste, made Harry start and cough. Draco promptly tried to pull away, and Harry shook his head—which probably came across as a really _strange _sensation to Draco—and grabbed hold of him behind the legs. Draco's mouth hung open as he got into an odd position, half-kneel and half-crouch, and rocked back and forth, his head hanging down, his hair almost brushing the bed.

Harry sucked, and gulped, and snapped his tongue down on nothingness and on skin, and Draco cried above him. Harry felt the magic pouring out of him change; now the coils of light above Draco were blue and pulled tight with what Harry thought was probably his own smugness. He grinned and went on swallowing.

Then Severus pushed a finger inside him.

Harry didn't have time for surprise or warnings or anything of the sort; he felt himself arch, he heard himself cry, and the magic pouring through his body turned shimmering and white-hot. As he came, the pleasure dragging at him, pulling through his mouth and his belly and dragging Draco's orgasm out after his own, his one coherent thought was to hope that he didn't burn Severus.

Then there was no coherent thought at all.

* * *

Severus pulled back from Harry and felt his eyes half-close, not because he was tired but from his sheer satisfaction at having rendered Harry Potter limp and satiated.

Harry lay with his head tipped to the side, his wild hair spilling out across the pillow but still for the moment, his wild eyes a hazy, dissolved green. His hands rose and then dropped back to his sides. His mouth opened, and a sound probably best spelled as "Gnnngh" emerged.

Draco was in a similar state, but he had enough energy to twist around to smile at Severus, and Severus grabbed him and arranged him in one smooth motion, and presented his own cock.

"Watch," Severus whispered, as he set his knees and leaned back, with his hands on the pillows and mattress next to him, to enjoy the heat of Draco's throat. "I will expect you to do something like this _next _time, Mr. Potter."

Harry started and opened his eyes, and Severus recalled that that had been the way he addressed Harry in school. Perhaps it was not unusual for Harry to feel anxious when he heard the name again, worried that he had done something wrong.

But then Draco extended his tongue and stroked gently, slyly, along the bottom of Severus's length, and Severus lost most of his concentration for anything that was not the immediate pleasure.

Draco was very good at this: patient at things that he wanted to learn, clever, inventive, good with his hands. He licked and sucked and lapped at first, giving Severus just a taste of warmth, and then sucking so deep and hard that Severus's hips flexed and he felt his balls draw up against his body. Draco grinned at him, a sloppy grin that Severus had learned to treasure, and went back to sucking.

Severus let one hand wander to Draco's hair and gripped there, pulling his head up against the pull of his mouth. Draco made a sharp, contented noise, and the strength of his throat grew all the more. Severus hissed, and arched, and felt the orgasm building down at the base of his spine, thick and welcome.

Then it came, then _he _came, and there was stickiness and a tingle running through him and the few exquisite moments when he felt as if the world had turned inside out.

Then it was over, and Severus bent down, awkward as the position was, and kissed Draco as he pulled back from Severus's groin. Draco returned the kiss enthusiastically, letting his tongue lap at the air as if begging. That would have made Severus hard again if anything could, the image of Draco begging.

And if he was joined by Harry…

Yes, that was a twitch in his groin. Severus smiled lazily and turned to Harry, letting himself sprawl across Harry's legs, though he did pause a moment to rearrange things so that Harry's knees were not poking him in the stomach. Draco crawled across them both, with a kiss to Severus's hair and Harry's forehead, to collapse on the bed with his arms cradling Harry.

"That is what this can be," Severus murmured. He thought he was the least exhausted of all of them, though he had done the most work. Well, this had been Harry's first sexual experience, and Draco was often quite sleepy after he came the first time, and Severus did not particularly want to wake him up for more at the moment. "Do you still wish it?"

Harry gave him a green-eyed stare, combed his fingers through Draco's hair, and reached out. When Severus kissed his fingers, Harry lunged up, disarranging Draco and making him grumble, and kissed him.

"Yes," Harry said. "_Yes, I fucking do._"

* * *

Draco woke happy.

It was a small thing, but then again, there had not been many times during the last three years that he was happy in _this _way, the way that seemed to pulse through him like a flow of honey from a hive and leave him open and wavering, his mouth falling wide, drowned in gold and gentleness.

_And obviously it's affected my thinking._

Draco flipped over on his elbows and studied his bedmates. Sometime during the night, he'd worked himself away from Harry, and now Harry lay sprawled with his arm outstretched as though embracing the air. Severus was on the other side of Harry, his eyes closed and his face locked in a frown. Draco would have been concerned, except that Severus always slept like that, and at least the frown was less severe than some that Draco had seen on him in the past.

He leaned over and breathed gently on Severus's ear. "Wake up," he whispered. "The first morning of the rest of your life is waiting for you."

Severus was awake at once, of course, his muscles tensed to hit whoever was touching him, a skill he had needed many times during the course of the war. But when he realized it was Draco, he raised himself on his elbow, too, and a dangerous smile worked its way over his face. "You think this changed something, then?" he asked.

Draco hesitated. But he had become better at reading Severus over the last few months, and he saw the half-buried flicker in his eyes, and the way that his other hand hadn't moved away from Harry. Draco smiled in relief and touched his elbow. "Yes," he said. "You _know _that it did, or you wouldn't be clinging on to Harry the way you are, as if he's keeping you afloat."

"You do come up with the most ridiculous metaphors sometimes, Draco," Severus said tolerantly, but he unwound his arm from Harry and reached out to catch the nape of Draco's neck, pulling him close enough to kiss. Draco went willingly, and let his mouth fall open and his tongue snake out when it seemed that Severus might end the kiss early. Severus groaned under his breath—a sound that he would never admit he made, even when Draco confronted him with a Pensieve memory of it—and pressed further into the kiss.

Draco, leaning over Harry from the left side, abruptly lost his balance and sprawled on top of Harry. A glance up at Severus showed his mouth parted slightly and his eyes darkening, which meant he had done that on purpose. Draco opened his mouth to protest.

"Do you usually wake people up by driving all the air out of their lungs with your elbow?"

Draco started and looked down at Harry, whose eyes were open now, that vivid green that Draco would never get tired of looking at. He smiled at both of them and then yawned, turning to the pillow. "I'm going to get some more sleep."

Severus said nothing, and Draco was too disappointed to, but then he saw Severus reach out and run one hand down the side of Harry's shoulder.

Harry tilted his head to the side, and his breathing changed as if he were considering something interesting. "You have my attention," he said, after a moment of straining silence.

Severus smiled and closed his eyes, burying his face in the corner of Harry's shoulder. Draco saw his jaw flex as if he were tasting Harry's skin, and Harry moaned in the next second, twisting around to kiss Severus.

Draco entered the kiss, holding both of their faces steady so that he could apply his lips. Harry curled an arm around his neck and gave him his own kiss when he was done thoroughly teasing Severus's mouth. Draco rutted gently against Harry's hip, and Harry laughed at him and reached down to attend to him. At the same moment, Severus reached around Harry and down.

That was how Draco found that he was better at one thing than Harry was, something that had nothing to do with negotiations or diplomacy: Harry Potter found it extraordinarily difficult to concentrate on stroking someone's cock when someone else had hold of _his_. Draco grinned, decided to make it even harder, and reached down to link his hand with Severus's, watching as both of theirs glided back and forth.

Harry gasped, but sped up his hand until Draco would have been afraid that Harry would chafe half the skin off him, except that it felt madly good. He made sure to have his lips on Harry's when he came, and to watch Harry's face as his eyes and mouth relaxed and he shuddered, and then to look up in time to watch Severus, leisurely working himself while he stroked Harry through the last of his climax.

Harry opened his mouth after Severus had come against his back, and murmured, "Ah, so I was wrong. _That _is the way that you wake each other up every morning."

"Very good," said Severus, and his eyes shone in a way that Draco hadn't seen them do in far too long. "You have it now."

Harry rolled over and put his hands behind his head, ignoring the way that he got come in his hair. He studied them both, and Draco fluttered his eyelashes at him. Harry snorted and elbowed him in the side.

"What are you thinking?" Severus asked, showing Draco that he, too, had recognized that firm, steady quality in the way Harry's eyes stared at them.

"That I'm lucky," Harry said simply. "And that I never would have predicted this when I became a hostage to the Ashborn."

Draco frowned as he felt a sour note introduce itself to the conversation, and flopped back on the bed. "You know that your friends won't like this, right?" he told the ceiling. "They'll be sure that we tricked you into it, or that you succumbed to our darkness and are joining us because you're evil, or something."

Harry sighed. "You don't say it the right way to sound like Ron _or _Hermione," he told Draco. "You need more splutter in your voice, and a higher pitch."

Draco rolled over and stared at him, making sure that Harry couldn't escape his stare and understood how severe this was. "So—what? You honestly think that they'll be all right with this and not care what you do?"

Harry shook his head, ran his hand through his hair, and this time found the drying stickiness there. He snorted and fumbled with his wand to cast a Cleaning Charm. Draco hovered over him, shooting glances at Severus. About this one thing, it seemed, Severus was calmer than Draco, because he did nothing but catch Draco's eye and then nod back towards Harry as if that was where he should be looking.

"All right," Harry said. "I think what I need to do is speak to them, and explain what happened with Yaxley. That might reassure them that I'm not evil or mad; it's just that we really can't free some Ashborn without them turning into Death Eaters again. And I think I ought to go back to the Burrow and spend some time with my friends, too." He watched them both carefully, and Draco was surprised to realize that he could recognize the signs of bracing tension in Harry's face and arms, as though he thought Draco and Severus would, of course, object and he had to be ready to meet the objection.

"I think," Severus said, his voice gentle and intense, "that you ought to go to them, and speak to them, and take as much time as you need. Only that way will you reassure them that we cannot make you run back to our bed at the crook of a finger."

Draco spun around to stare at him. "You _want _him to do that?" he spluttered. "When we've only just got him here?"

"You've had me here for more than a month, Draco," Harry said, his voice full of laughter that he managed to make not mocking in spite of everything. "I didn't even manage to spend a full week away. I think you can be confident that I'll come back."

"I didn't mean _that_," Draco said, and reached out to lay his hand over Harry's heart. "But now that we've finally managed to persuade you to share our bed, to be here in heart and mind as well as body, you want us to let you go?"

Harry's eyes widened, and then softened. He caught Draco's hand and kissed the palm. Draco swallowed, watching him carefully. He no longer felt the simple, uncomplicated happiness that he had when he first awoke, and mourned that. But what burned in Harry's eyes promised something that might be as good, if more complex.

"I'll come back," Harry said. "But I want peace between the halves of my life, and I want to introduce Ron and Hermione to the new parts of the person I am. That means telling them that you're my lovers." He half-rolled and held out his free hand over Draco's head, to Severus, who caught it and held it, gazing at him. "Unless that's something that you'd prefer to keep quiet for now?"

"Let them know," said Severus. "It may soothe their suspicions in the end, this honesty, and I do not need your friends for enemies. I have seen what they are able to do in the line of bringing down Dark Lords."

Harry grinned at him, and then turned to Draco. "Draco? What about you? Are you all right with it?"

Draco grinned at him, and made himself shove away the feeling that Harry might not come back if he went for a visit to the Burrow. If Harry said that he would come back, then he would. "Are you kidding?" he whispered, and kissed Harry. "I want something that I can hold over Weasley's head like that. Two years on the run with you, and he never managed to trip you into bed. A month with us, and Severus and I have you accepting sex with two men."

Harry laughed, but his face went more than slightly green. "Don't even _dream _of saying something like that to Ron, Draco," he said, pointing an accusing finger at him. "I would never hear the end of it, and I really don't think about him that way."

"But does he think about you that way?" Draco fluttered his eyelashes again, and Harry snorted again and rolled to the edge of the bed to stand up.

"I don't want to know. But—" He hesitated, and looked back at them. Draco let himself recline against Severus, so that they became more like a single person that Harry was regarding. Harry half-smiled and inclined his head.

"Thank you," he said quietly. "It's wonderful."

And then he stood up and stretched, and Draco, watching his naked back and arse move and thinking of all the pleasures they hadn't even explored yet, felt his complex happiness burst into being.


	36. Getting Warmer

Thank you again for all the reviews!

_Chapter Thirty-Six—Getting Warmer_

"There is no need to ask what _you _have been doing."

Laughter's voice was sly and knowing. It could have been only one of the two, Draco thought, and he still would have flushed. He wasn't very good at controlling his emotional reactions. The closest he had ever come to it was during the depressive period when he lived so much in Severus's shadow, and he didn't particularly want to return to that time. He might have to accept that this was the best he could do for now.

"I have two lovers," he said instead, sitting down in the grass beside Laughter. "It takes more than a bit to keep them satisfied."

Laughter paused, and there was a moment when Draco thought he might lunge forwards and attack. The werewolves had a number of petty little laws and concerns that Draco didn't understand yet, despite studying them as much as he could on these dream-visits to Laughter. They weren't exactly the same as werewolves in the old pure-blood alliance, who could alternate between being considered humans and magical creatures depending on the circumstance and the people they were with.

Then Laughter smiled at him and said, "That is a good answer, and I am rewarded for my snooping. If I heard something I did not wish to hear, that is no one's fault but my own." He leaned forwards. "I wished to hear what progress you have made on bringing the merfolk into the alliance."

"I have been studying them," Draco said, and grimaced. "But it seems the centaurs have a grudge against them, and though I have someone who speaks Mermish, she admits that it's not well." He and Incognita had spent most of yesterday talking about it. She had gained expertise from a translating spell, but she knew few of the words by heart, and, she had warned Draco, translating charms had a tendency to fail underwater.

"The centaurs' grudge is ancient and tangled with the first alliance," Laughter said. "I believe that you do not wish your alliance to be a mere copy of that one, as you have done certain things differently."

Draco smiled in spite of himself to hear Laughter call the alliance _his_. Laughter gave him a sidelong look, and Draco reminded himself that showing how pleased he was might be one of the stupidest things he could do. He tried to remain grave as he nodded. "That's true. Provided that I give everyone an equal place in the alliance, I don't think they can complain."

Laughter snorted and rolled over onto his back, extending his hands along the ground so that he could feel the blades of grass prickling between his fingers. "If your goal is to create an alliance based on that, then you'll never make a good leader. I can tell you, you can be scrupulously fair and correct, and people only appreciate that until it's one of their pet projects or needs that they feel slighted about."

Draco grimaced. "Thanks for the warning. Is there any advice you would give me on dealing with the merfolk, then?"

"If I give it to you," Laughter said, rolling over and studying him from his belly-crouched-low position that always made Draco nervously think about a wolf stalking prey, "will you give me something in return?"

"You know I will," Draco said. "I've tried to give you a centaur negotiator who respects your positions already."

Laughter gave him a brief smile. "You'll do," he said. "This is rather more than that. I heard that Harry Potter had come back to you. I'd like a look at him, see what the fuss is about this Dark Lord slayer. Can you get him to agree to visit?"

Draco licked his lips, and thought about that. Then he said, "He might be reluctant. He might think it's a trap." He knew Harry had wanted to come, but that was Harry in the desperate stage of remorse when he would promise everything to the people he had hurt. Draco wasn't at all sure whether his remorse would remain as strong when he realized that there could be danger, and demands.

"I can give him safe conduct for the meeting," Laughter said, waving one hand to dismiss the concerns. "And I am perfectly satisfied with you as a negotiator. But both you and Thera seemed to feel his presence would change the alliance, that there is something odd or special about him. I have decided that I need to meet him face-to-face, so I can judge whether there is or not for myself."

Draco smiled a little. He wondered if that was Laughter's way of angling for him to talk about Harry, because he knew they had recently become lovers. Well, Draco wasn't as reluctant to talk as he thought Harry might be to visit.

"He's remarkable," he said simply, gratified when Laughter sat up and focused on him. "I can tell you that and have it be true in all the senses of the word. Yes, he defeated the Dark Lord, but he only did it after a few years of hard and dedicated struggle. His two best friends helped him, but he was the one who had to use the spell that killed the Dark Lord, and then found himself leader of what was left of wizarding society in the aftermath."

Laughter showed a single canine tooth as his lips flicked up. "From rumors I have heard, that part he supposedly led was only too eager to sacrifice him to secure their victory."

Draco snorted. "That's true, but I think he's impressed the Ministry into leaving him alone for now." Although part of him burned to tell the truth, he thought it was more important to preserve the secret of how they had acted together, just in case Laughter balked at the illegal nature of it. "He only had a few enemies in the Ministry itself. Many more of them were simply afraid of him."

"Are you?"

Draco blinked. If there was one question he hadn't expected Laughter to ask, it was that one, when Draco had admitted that he was Harry's ally and lover.

But it was a fair one, and from Laughter's intent, still stare, Draco thought he probably wanted him to answer it. Draco gave it some consideration, his mind filled with flickers of scars, of his hand moving on Harry's skin, of the way that Harry's eyes had burned when he looked Draco in the face and then away. Of the way his hands had clenched and tightened beneath Draco's, as Draco laid his fingers on them.

"No," he said at last. "But I think I'm unusual in that I've known him for a long time now and I was his enemy at first, then changed my mind."

"Would you say that that's a gift he has? Making his enemies into friends?"

Draco shook his head. "No, or he would never have had enemies in the Ministry in the first place, or he would have taught them all to fear him or at least keep quiet before this. He's more—impressive, as I said. People who let themselves think falsely about that impressiveness, who expect him to be some grand and thunderous hero, are the ones who create the mistake and the mystique. If you approach him as you would anyone else powerful and dangerous who's done something impressive, then I think you'll rate him exactly as he should be rated."

One of Laughter's ears twitched backwards; one twitched forwards. It was the most wolf-like move Draco had seen him make while still in human form, despite all the twitches and snarls of his mouth.

Then he nodded and said, "Fair enough. You've given me a picture that _sounds _accurate." Draco smiled in spite of himself. "Bring Potter to meet me tomorrow.

"In the meantime, the merfolk." Laughter sat upright and adopted a voice that reminded Draco of McGonagall's when she was teaching a particularly stubborn class. "The first thing you must remember about them is that they are proud, intolerably proud, and they will never forgive you if they think you have infringed on that pride…"

* * *

"What did they do to you?"

Harry blinked and pulled his left foot cautiously from the fireplace, where his right one had gone through into the Burrow's drawing room confidently. He eyed Hermione, who stood with her arms folded next to the chair that sat opposite the fireplace and glared at him.

"What do you mean?" he asked, and had to stifle a yawn. They had slept in this morning, really, but there had been plenty of vigorous exercise last night.

"You look different." Hermione snapped her head up and down, as though nodding emphatically at someone Harry couldn't see. "Just—different. The way you move, the expression on your face." She paused and leaned nearer, then gaped at him.

Harry felt his face flame red. Of course, he tried to stop it, because that would be all Hermione needed to reach the _right _conclusion, but it was a little late for that, and Hermione pointed one finger at him and then dropped her arm and shook her head and all but stamped her foot.

"Harry James Potter!" she exclaimed. "What are you—you _slept _with them, didn't you?"

"Slept with who?" Ron was walking in from the kitchen, balancing an enormous sandwich on a plate in front of him. Harry saw crisps and marmalade between the slices of bread, and who knew what else. He blinked. Sometimes it still hurt to be reminded that his friends were ordinary teenagers, or would have been that way if he hadn't involved them in the Horcrux hunt. "Is there a shortage of beds at the fortress or something?"

Then he looked up at Harry's face, and almost dropped his sandwich.

"You slept with _them!"_ he said, started to point a finger at Harry, then looked around for a safe place to put his sandwich and set it down on the seat of a chair before he pointed. "Mate, I didn't think—I mean, I know you were talking about them like that, but we thought it would be ages before anything happened—"

The dull burn in Harry's face was becoming actively painful, and although he had come to the Burrow partially so that he could see the rest of the Weasleys, he wanted to hiss at his friends to stop talking. He cleared his throat and cast a Listening Charm, one they'd often used when on the Horcrux hunt, that would bring all the noise in the house directly to his ears. He relaxed a little when he realized that he wasn't hearing anyone else. Just Ron and Hermione here to notice his shame and be loud about it.

"It's not what you think," he began, feebly.

Hermione sniffed and folded her arms. "Then what _is _it?" she demanded. "I think it's exactly what we think it is. You _slept _with our old Potions professor and that git Malfoy, and now you're come to—what? Apologize? Excuse it?"

"I didn't think you trusted them enough to do that yet," Ron said. He had a weird expression on his face. After peering at him, Harry decided it was a combination of wanting to sick up and struggling to keep the nausea down so that he could have this conversation in the first place.

"I didn't know I did," Harry had to admit. "But—"

He paused, and thought back to last night. It was true there had been no sudden change in how much he trusted Draco and Severus, although working together to stop the Ministry from persecuting them and Severus agreeing to free as many of the Ashborn as he could had a lot to do with it. But there also hadn't been a reason to wait years and months to dance around each other. He admired Draco for the way he had grown and the independence he had achieved; he admired the way Severus had done things Harry hadn't thought he would dream of doing.

And he had wanted to. He had done very few things in his life simply because he wanted to, and probably none as important.

Wasn't everyone always telling him that he should do more things just because he wanted to? He lifted his head and smiled at Ron and Hermione. Hermione frowned at him, but Ron got a faint smile on his face in return. Harry thought he had probably looked like this that day in the garden when he had told Ron that he really _liked _helping people and wanted to continue on with it.

"I wanted to see what it was like," Harry said. "And I was tired of missing out on something that everyone always insisted was enjoyable. I hadn't done it before, so I wanted to try it."

Hermione stared at him, her eyes widening, her cheeks flushing. "But surely you and Ginny—"

"If they did, I don't want to know," Ron said, loudly enough to make Harry wonder if the neighbors would hear.

"We didn't," Harry said, and this time his smile was really meant to reassure Ron more than anything else. "But I thought when I went to be a hostage of the Ashborn that I would never get to do anything like that. I didn't think Snape would let me visit Ginny, and there was no one else I wanted, and at the time, I couldn't conceive of finding someone there I could want. The Ashborn, certainly not. And Snape and Malfoy, holding me captive? No."

"Then how have you changed your mind?" Hermione sat up and folded her hands primly in her lap, as though there was some law about how far they should be allowed to stray from her body. "I can't—Harry, I can't _conceive _of how you could have got to this point. Snape and Malfoy were your captors."

"Are they now?" Harry asked quietly. "I don't think I would have wanted to have anything to do with them if they had stayed the same, but they haven't."

Hermione hesitated. Then she said, as if exploring a new idea, "They did make Unbreakable Vows to you when you left, and had you make them to them."

"Or to Severus," Harry said, trying out the name aloud in front of other people as much to see how they would react as anything else. Both Ron and Hermione stared, and then their faces seemed to shut down. Harry gave a mental shrug. He had to admit he would have done the same thing if either of his friends had got involved with people they'd hated during school. "But yes, that changed things. And I was able to leave freely this time, and I'll go back to them freely when I want to."

"Things have changed, fine," Hermione said, and her hands squeezed tighter. "But—oh, Harry, I'm afraid that you won't be happy with them, that you'll get your heart broken."

"There's always the chance of that," Harry agreed, and tried to sound calm and mature and knowing so he wouldn't reveal just how strongly that fear told on him, too, and how much it dried his throat out. "But I think there would be the chance of that with anyone. We're all marked by the war, and I don't want someone entirely innocent of it. There's too much about me that they couldn't understand."

"Well, if you want someone _Marked_, you've found them," Ron muttered.

Hermione hit Ron on the shoulder, probably more for how awful his pun was than any other reason, and then faced Harry again. "All right, fine. But aren't you afraid that Malfoy could start taunting you about your parents again, or that Snape is—I don't want to say it, Harry, but Snape could see your father in you, and decide to hate and punish you for that."

"I think," Harry said delicately, feeling out the words as he said them, because he had thought them only that morning, "that that's not going to happen. Too much has changed. The war changed both Draco and Severus from the people they were, and taught them that what happened to them at Hogwarts wasn't the worst thing that could ever happen. They lapsed into these unchanging states for a while, before I was there, where Severus did nothing but brew and take new Ashborn, and Draco was—I'm not sure there's even a word for how cramped he was, in his mind and his body. But now they're better than that. And if it ends because of something like that, then, well, I'll recover and go on. I'm still here despite my parents dying and Sirius dying and Dumbledore dying and having to kill Voldemort and the Ministry betraying me. I don't think I'm that fragile."

"Fragility has nothing to do with getting your heart broken," Hermione started.

"Leave him alone, dear," Ron said, in exactly the tone that Harry had heard Mr. Weasley use to Mrs. Weasley. "Can't you see that he's determined to do it no matter what?'

Hermione looked up at Ron with her lips parted, and then laughed. "I'm not your mum," she said.

"But sometimes it's worth trying," Ron said, and grinned at her. Harry watched them for a moment, and nodded. _Yes. _That was the kind of love he wanted, where they depended on each other so much that they shared laughter and arguments as well as past events and sex. And if his relationship with Draco and Severus didn't eventually turn into that, if it soured, then he would go and find it elsewhere. "Really, Hermione, I think Harry deserves the right to make his own mistakes as much as we did."

"You think it's a mistake, then?" Harry asked him quietly. "Really?"

Ron shrugged, his eyes huge and steady, with a slight shine in them that Harry thought was pride instead of anger. "For me? It would be. I couldn't get over the stupid shit that Malfoy did to me in school no matter what. And I think it's kind of fucked-up to be sleeping with a man who could be your father."

Harry winced a little.

"I'm sorry," Ron added quickly. "But you're the one who has to make the decision, just like you were the one who had to make the decision about going to the Ashborn. You know that we would have fought for you if you didn't want to be a hostage, braved a second war for you. We'll support you in this, because you have to make the decision that satisfies you, in the end."

Harry nodded slowly. It wasn't the expression of whole-hearted support he had dreamed of, but then, whole-hearted support on _this _from Ron and Hermione might have meant they were brainwashed. "Thanks," he mumbled.

Ron grinned and punched him on the shoulder. "You're welcome. Now, are you going to come have a proper lunch, or what?"

Harry blinked at Ron's huge sandwich.

"That's morning tea," Ron said, unabashed, and bit into the sandwich, making crisp bits fly everywhere. Hermione gave him a single scathing look.

Harry tried to imagine Ron sitting at a table with Draco and Severus, and grinned. Hermione and Severus might bond over deprecation of how awful his manners were, actually.

_I'll keep that in mind as an emergency plan. _

He followed his best friends into the kitchen, glad that the first breaking of the news was over with, and grateful to think about lunch.

* * *

Severus leaned back and slowly circled the glass globe sitting on the table in which his new potion to read the thoughts of the bound Ashborn bubbled and glowed. This time, the potion had turned gold, and Severus was not sure whether that was a regression or not. It should have turned white, if his theoretical predictions were correct, but at least it was not red or blue.

He spent a moment evaluating the globe. Then he reached back for the last ingredient, a holly leaf so fresh that he had had to break several Preservation Charms to bring it out of the cupboard where he kept it. He held the dark green, gleaming thing above the globe, and then let it fall, lazily tumbling end over end.

It landed in the golden potion and floated on the top for a moment, like a fly landing on the surface of amber. Then there was a brittle snapping sound and the potion turned the color of ice.

Severus smiled with his mouth only. And there was the whiteness, only slightly off from where he had predicted it would be.

He waited for the moment the potion would bristle out with branches again, shadows that he would have to interpret to read what moved in Harry's memory. With Harry's permission, he had used a memory of his for this potion, though Severus had told him to choose which one so as to make the process of interpretation harder.

But the potion remained still, although darkness gathered under the surface near the top of the globe. After another moment, Severus allowed himself another smile.

He fell back a step and aimed his wand at the globe. The step was only cautious, and only good sense. He had no idea what would happen, though he might have chosen some possibilities as more likely than others. Sharp, sparking energy ran up and down his spine, and lingered like fire behind his teeth.

"_Legilimens_," he breathed.

The air around him seemed to freeze and then shatter the same way that the ice in the globe might have. Whirling power grasped Severus and flung him ahead, a more dangerous and explosive experience than traveling by Portkey. He felt as if he were tumbling down a waterfall. He opened his mouth to gasp in—

And then he was floating in the middle of a memory, serenely. Except that his feet weren't in contact with the ground, it was as clear as being in the middle of a Pensieve.

The memory was of a small, dark place, so crowded that Severus felt the urge to stretch out despite knowing that none of it was real. The air around him felt hot and musty. He heard a slight bang in front of him and lit his wand with a murmured _Lumos. _The light promptly sprang to life, revealing a cupboard. Someone banged down above the roof of it, which let Severus deduce it was underneath stairs.

The smaller sound had come from Harry, who sat with his arms looped around knees drawn almost up to his chin, and stared straight ahead of him. He looked as he had during his fifth year, perhaps. He sat on what had once, clearly, been his bed, a mattress leaking stuffing and covered with stains, but which was now too small for him. As it was, his kneecaps nearly brushed the roof of the cupboard.

Severus narrowed his eyes as he examined him. Harry's expression was blank, and his eyes glassy. Now and then his fingers tightened around his legs as though he would scratch the skin, but they always flexed back before that happened and before Severus would have felt compelled to intervene.

He shook his head and reminded himself that he _could not _intervene, in any case. This was a memory, and that meant it had already happened. He simply took a step back and leaned against the wall in the moment before someone flung the door open and stuck her head inside.

Severus had to hold back a shocked snicker when he saw the way Petunia had turned out. Yes, he had glimpsed her in a few of Harry's memories before now, but this was the most direct look he had taken, and the unfortunately long neck and nose dominated the portrait. She had teased him about his own homeliness when they were children; Severus would have given much then to grasp a picture of this future and show it to her.

_But not if it means that they had once again taken to sealing Harry under the stairs._

"What are you doing under there?" Petunia hissed in a whisper, looking up and down outside the cupboard as if she expected members of the Order of the Phoenix to spy on her. Severus again wished this memory was real, simply so that he could see her expression when she saw him. "Get out right _now_."

She shot out one hand as if to grasp Harry's arm and drag him free, but he leaned forwards, and she missed. He turned on her a gaze so alien that Severus's hand went to his wand before he thought about it. This did look like a boy who might attack.

"Nothing," Harry whispered, his voice almost sepulchral. "I'm doing _nothing_. Just the way that you always wished I would," he added, and the twist at the corner of his mouth and the flare in his eyes made Severus suddenly certain that this had happened when he was mourning Black's death.

Petunia stared at him, then shook her head. "You can't stay under there," she said. "Go up in your room if you want to _think_, but you can't stay under there." And she turned and paraded off, leaving the door of the cupboard open.

Harry shut his eyes, but Severus could see even without hearing his thoughts that his concentration had shattered when his aunt interrupted. Severus found himself grateful for that, on second thought. It would not have been useful at all for Harry to have completed whatever he was focusing on so intently, not when his grief for Black was overpowering him.

Harry clenched his jaw and inched out of the cupboard, shutting the door behind him. Petunia was in the kitchen and kept her back stubbornly turned as Harry climbed the stairs. Severus followed him in silence, and made sure he was inside as Harry shut the door of his bedroom.

The space seemed mostly occupied with broken Muggle toys, not of the kind that Severus assumed Harry would have chosen for himself. He sat down with his hands on his knees and his stare fixed straight ahead, on the perch and cage in the corner. His white owl flailed over to him and hooted, then landed on Harry's knee and stared up at him worriedly when he didn't notice. Harry petted her feathers, but there was something mechanical about the motion.

Severus watched in silence. He still did not know why Harry had chosen to show him this memory, as it seemed nothing dramatic would happen—and indeed, the corners of the memory were already darkening, in a way that meant it would soon end.

_But that is almost certainly the point, _he thought a moment later, with a faint snort. _He wanted me to see an ordinary day, something that doesn't relate to the moments in his life when he killed the Dark Lord or violated school rules. He mourns like anyone else, and he is trusting me not to throw that back in his face._

A relationship with a Gryffindor was rather like a bullfight, it seemed. Dance in and then dance back, and dare the other to do his worst. If Severus did something Harry interpreted as a gesture of trust, then he had to do the same thing back.

Even as Severus thought that, the memory darkened, and left him standing outside the globe, staring in at the ice-colored potion.

The potion that would need a few more adjustments, but was otherwise nearly ready.

Severus smiled and let the door of his own memory fall closed on what he had seen, for the moment, while he concentrated on adjusting the proportions of the ingredients in the list he kept neatly at hand.

* * *

"I'm asking you to come with me when I visit Laughter tonight."

Harry frowned at him through the fire, and for a moment, Draco feared that he would disregard what Draco had asked him to do entirely. But then he nodded. "A dream-visit, like the one I made to the vampires?" Then he grimaced and shook his head. "Not that that one worked out too well."

"This time, I'll be with you," Draco said steadily. "And I hope that you don't do something that angers Laughter too badly."

Harry snorted and said, "This is me. I'm not the negotiator that you are, and I want to be involved in the alliance, but not in a way that'll make me make sacrifices for no return. Just keep that in mind when you're introducing me to your allies."

"_Our _allies," Draco corrected him. "You made the oath to the centaurs, who in turn are vowed to the werewolves, and so am I. That makes you as much a werewolf ally as swearing to them directly."

"Then why does Laughter want to see me?" Harry looked over his shoulder as though he heard someone calling him from inside the Burrow, but returned his attention to Draco soon enough. "He ought to feel as comfortable with me as with any of his other allies, if he believes in the tenets of the old alliance."

"An excellent question," Draco said, and Harry smiled so warmly at the praise that Draco reminded himself to say things like that more often. "But I think it's because there was no one like you in the old alliance. No one with such prestige and so much personal power. Most of the time, wizards fought together to kill Dark Lords, instead of depending on one prophesied savior."

"The prophecy making the difference," Harry murmured, with a nod. "All right. How are you going to give me the coordinates of the dream clearing?"

"This way," Draco said, and touched his wand to his own temple, closing his eyes as the memory of the last time he had passed with Laughter rose to the forefront. When he was sure he had the length of the trees and the sheen of the leaves right, he opened his eyes and brought out the swirling strand of memory. "I'll put this in a sealed Pensieve and send it to you with Corners, if you like."

Harry sighed a little. "That might be the best idea. I forgot to tell Shield where I was going this morning, it seems, and he showed up at the Burrow an hour ago, screaming his head off. I had to put him in a cage until he calmed down, which he doesn't really show any sign of doing yet." He turned his head to look over his shoulder again, and this time, Draco thought he caught the sound of a faint, high scream—the kind that a dragon might give when it was caged behind Silencing Charms.

"Oh, dear," Draco said, and knew he was grinning when Harry looked back at him with one eyebrow raised. "Well, that's life with a guardian dragon bound to your soul."

"One that _someone smug _made for me," Harry said, but the words no longer stung Draco the way they once would have. "Anyway. I'll look forward to your owl. And now I have to go soothe Shield and untangle Hermione's hair from the wall."

Draco blinked. "What happened?"

"Better not to ask," Harry said darkly, and then he vanished from the fire as the Floo connection closed.

Draco spent a pleasant few moments imagining what might have happened to the smug and prissy Granger anyway, and then went to his Pensieve and dropped the single strand of memory in. A swift charm stretched a thin layer of magic over the top so that it couldn't spill, and then Draco looked around at the table next to his bed.

A teacup stood there, containing Corners. From what Harry had said, he had gone wandering for a short time, perhaps to see if he wanted to return to the ocean with the rest of the Water People. But he had come back last night, and shown no inclination to seek Harry at the Burrow, curling up in the glass instead. Draco thought he was probably trying to make up his mind about the alliance as well, and spend time around other people who weren't Harry or Parselmouths, to see how he liked them.

Draco tapped gently on the side of the glass. Corners put his head out of the cup and looked sleepily at Draco.

Or perhaps Draco was only imagining the sleepiness. Draco had to admit to himself that he was hardly an expert in reading the expressions of snakes made of water, after all.

Draco held up the Pensieve and waved his wand, conjuring an image of Harry in the air. It hovered to one side of the sealed Pensieve, with its hands extended and a pleading look in its eyes. That was the best Draco could do to communicate with a serpent who only spoke Parseltongue. He lowered his wand and gave Corners the most direct look he could.

Corners's tongue flicked out and then back and forth as if checking the air for dangerous scents. In the end, he flexed his body out of the cup, curled around the Pensieve, and gave Draco something like a nod before he flowed towards the corner of the room. He drained away under the wall, and although Draco waited for the Pensieve to be caught, it wasn't, any more than the potions vials Severus had given him to carry through the Ministry had been. Perhaps he dissolved the substance of the harder objects into his own.

Draco sat down on the bed and sighed. If all went well, he should see Harry in the Forest tonight, and they could start planning the next phase of the alliance, or introduce Laughter to Harry, or whatever seemed like it should be the best method of setting up the alliance.

Someone knocked on the door. Draco stared blankly at it before remembering that he had asked Incognita to come by, so they could discuss her knowledge of Mermish and the best way to approach the merfolk that everyone was so touchy about. He sat up and called, "Come in."

Incognita looked more than a little out of place in Draco's neat, restrained rooms, though that might only be the effect of her bright green robes. Draco thought she had adopted them because they would mark her out as so different from the black and grey robes of the Ashborn. She gave Draco a sharp look as she stood there with her hand on the door.

"You look as though you were considering something else when I came in," she said. "Should I leave?"

Draco would have welcomed some time alone, but he knew he would do nothing productive with it, simply lie around feeling sorry for himself and wishing that Harry was back or that Severus had come out of his lab for dinner.

_At least working on the alliance is productive, even if sometimes I don't feel like doing it._

"It's nothing important," he said. "I've got all the books I could find in the library on the merfolk." He gestured at the heavy tomes spread out over the table beside his bed, and little by little Incognita came in and sat down in the heavy chair he had conjured. "Now. Where do you think we should start?"


	37. Introductions All Around

Thank you again for all the reviews!

_Chapter Thirty-Seven—Introductions All Around_

Harry opened his eyes and looked around. He was standing in a clearing that at least _looked _pretty similar to a clearing in the Forbidden Forest, though of course he didn't absolutely know that it was. The trees were as tall, at least, and the gently rustling leaves around him didn't sound different from the ones he'd sometimes heard when moving through the Forest.

"Harry. There you are."

Harry turned around with a smile that he hoped didn't look as anxious as he felt. Draco smiled at him and beckoned him on, plunging into the Forest's undergrowth. Harry followed, tilting his head back so that he could look up at the trees overheard. In one way, this was different from the parts of the Forest he had been in before: the trees were considerably taller.

"This _is_ the right way?"

Draco paused and looked over his shoulder to smirk a bit, his hand resting on the trunk of a tree next to him. "Of course. Where did you think I was taking you, a bower of leaves to have my wicked way with you?" He licked his lips and winked.

Harry ignored the blush stealing over his face, because he knew he wouldn't be able to concentrate on what he should say next if he focused on that instead. "No," he said stoutly. "I just—I didn't know trees grew this big in the Forest."

It sounded like a stupid thing to say, but Draco only shrugged, not seeming interested one way or the other, and faced forwards. "Normally Laughter meets me here," he said. "I think he likes the privacy, the distance it has from Hogwarts. But this time, he must have wanted you to see a little more of the werewolves' defenses."

"I can't see a thing in this gloom," Harry said, and started to raise his wand to cast a _Lumos _Charm.

"Don't do it," Draco said, not looking back at him. "The werewolves get very touchy about anyone using magic around them without their permission, since their experience with it is so bad."

Harry blinked, then nodded, and concentrated on trying not to stumble as he followed Draco. He hardly thought he would make a very graceful impression if he catapulted onto his face in front of the werewolf leader.

They came to the edge of a wide space, at least as long as some of the trees were tall. Harry heard Draco draw in his breath, and he stood very still in front of Harry. Harry came to a halt, too, trying to ignore the wariness that made him feel as if he were walking on scorpions. Draco was the leader here, and so far, he only seemed cautious, not afraid.

Draco moved a little, and Harry could get a look at the clearing around his shoulder. It _was _huge, and sprawled across the ground in a way that made Harry wonder what would happen if he tried to walk it; he was sure the werewolves would have baited it with traps. The grass was tall enough to conceal all sorts of predators, and the moonlight turned it silver. Harry wondered for a moment whether the moon was full, but he didn't think either Draco or Laughter would have asked for a meeting then, for all their sakes.

Then the grass in front of them trembled, and a lean man leaped out, nodding to Harry before he fixed his eyes on Draco. Harry half-shivered. The golden eyes had, he was sure, taken in all that was important about him in that one glance, which meant the man didn't have to go on looking to understand him.

"You are here, Malfoy," Laughter said. "And that means the meeting can begin. I promised to provide you with more than I had so far." His eyes shifted back to Harry, and his smile had edges that Harry didn't think had names. "And I understand that Mr. Potter is also concerned about what the alliance can do for him. I wished to show him."

"You don't have to do everything for me right now," Harry said, pushing his glasses up his nose and wishing he could see better. The moonlight on Draco's hair was the only thing that really identified him to Harry right now, and Laughter's eyes cast their own light, or Harry thought he wouldn't be able to make out any of his expressions. "I'm happy to accept that you want to judge me, and we can talk later about what that means."

Laughter's teeth champed, and he seemed to laugh far down in his throat, so far that Harry shuddered just listening to the sound. "I'm sure that you _would _be happy to accept it," he said. "But you see, Thera has told me about certain broken promises, and the way that you felt you were being called on for sacrifices that no one would return for you. I wish to make sure that you don't feel that way here." He turned and let out a long, low call that drifted over the grass. It wasn't _quite _a howl, but Harry could hear some definite similarity there.

More werewolves came out of the grass, all of them walking on two legs, but loping comfortably like wolves or dogs. The nearest ones wore clothes. Harry was glad for that; it had been hard enough knowing where to rest his eyes when he was around Kleianthe or Thera. The ones who might not lurked in the background, while the watchers in the front rank squatted down and stared at Harry and Draco.

Draco still faced them with his head in the same posture, and Harry suspected he also maintained the same slightly bored expression. That was amazing, considering he had been told stories of werewolves being dangerous a lot longer than Harry had. But then, Draco was much braver than Harry had ever thought he was in school.

"Grass and Wind," said Laughter, and for a moment Harry thought it was some kind of werewolf oath, before two of the ones crouching in the grass stood up and moved forwards. He could make out the long, dark hair of a woman, and the brilliant amber-like eyes of an extremely tall man. "You will swear to him?"

"I will," said the man, and Harry relaxed a little despite himself. The man's voice reminded him of Remus's, the way that it could drag and catch around unexpected corners. He knelt down in front of Harry and held out his hands, his palms cupped as though he expected to receive a gift.

The woman took a bit longer to agree, turning to Laughter and cocking her head in a dog-like gesture. "You are _sure _that he will understand and appreciate this, Laughter? I bear the boy no ill-will, but this alliance is complex enough without all the other oaths that you want to add to it."

"I am sure, Grass." For a moment, Harry thought he saw the moonlight flash off Laughter's teeth, but that might be his clothes, or the way he turned his head. Either way, Grass seemed to accept his answer, because she dropped down with only a small grumble and extended her cupped palms, too.

"What are you making them do?" Harry asked Laughter. "I've had enough of Unbreakable Vows for one lifetime, and I made a vow to the centaurs."

"I am asking them to teach you," Laughter said. "They are the most skilled people who follow me. Grass is a good fighter, and she has made both blades and bread with her own hands. Wind can teach you more history than you know now and nearly as much astronomy as a centaur, and branches of magic, such as beast-speaking, that might be useful to someone with Parseltongue." Harry caught his breath, and was sure he saw Laughter smile. "Both of them can be your guards and your confidants in times of trouble, if you wish them to be. I wish to give you a future, some way to learn what your _unusual _life has denied you. Will you accept the gift?"

Harry opened his mouth, but Draco reached out, caught his wrist, and shook his head. Harry remembered who was the expert here, and shut his mouth again.

"What's the catch?" Draco asked quietly. "You said that you would give me information on reaching the merfolk, but Harry wasn't part of that agreement. What are you going to tell us, now, to pay that would be worth what you're offering?"

Laughter made a languid gesture, and someone off to the side lit a torch. Harry blinked in the sudden glare, blinked all the more when he realized that fewer of the werewolves were naked than he had thought, and frankly stared when he saw the way that Laughter looked at Draco.

He had to suppress the urge to utter a growl of his own, pathetic though it would have sounded when compared to the noises that the werewolves could make. Draco already _had _a lover, he already had _two_, and if Laughter thought either Harry or Severus would stand to be shunted aside…

Laughter's eyes rested on Harry for a moment, and his smile came and went. He moved backwards, inclining his head. "Thank you for reminding me that you are still the negotiator I trust," he told Draco. "In truth, this is a gesture of goodwill that I hope will build goodwill later. I know you, Mr. Potter, feel that few people have given you anything in your life, except demands for gifts and sacrifices. This is a gift. No strings attached—though I do ask that you not mistreat my people, of course." He offered a faint smile that again had more edges than Harry could count. "If you choose not to learn from them, or not to have them as guards, then there is no harm done. But if you grow more confident and calm around them, because of them, then I can hope that sometime in the future you may do good for us of your own free will."

Harry blinked and raised a hand to touch his throat before he thought about it. Then he took it away. There was a scar there that he didn't want to encourage the werewolves, or Draco, to look at too closely. "Thank you," he said, because there really was no other response he could make to a gift that generous. "And—as long as you _mean _that, then I can accept your gift."

"Good," Laughter said. "I do. I know what you could do to someone who irritated you with false promises, and of course, if I were faithless in making them, then you would not be honor-bound to hold back from harming me, by the terms of the alliance."

He turned to Grass and Wind and perhaps communicated something with his expression that Harry didn't catch, because both of them bowed their heads and extended their hands further. Harry stared at them, wondering if there was going to be a ritual like the one he and Thera had shared when he swore to the centaurs.

"Place a mark on them that will show them bound to your service until either they or you weary of it," Laughter said casually. "It may be anything you like."

Harry felt the revulsion crawling up his spine. Even the way Draco caught his eye and frowned couldn't make him change the expression on his face.

"I think I've had enough of marks, and scars," he said. "I can love the people with them, but I can't—give them. Can I choose something else instead?" He had looked at the tall grass in the clearing and remembered a Transfiguration that he had done when he was still Horcrux-hunting.

Laughter gazed into his face, and Harry had the impression that he saw more of what was there than Harry would have preferred him to see. But he nodded. "This is your contract. Of course you may."

Harry nodded back, although he noted the word "contract" as something he would have to ask more details of later, and reached out, plucking two blades of grass. He would have cut them with his wand, usually, but it seemed unwise to ask permission for any magic other than what he most needed. He lifted the two blades in front of Laughter and asked with his eyes, moving one hand slowly towards his wand.

Laughter nodded. He was watching Harry with eyes that had a kind of slow-burning light in the back of them. Harry thought he was granting Harry's request as much to gratify his own curiosity as anything else.

Harry turned back to Grass and Wind and made sure they were watching him as he Transfigured the blades into small books. He had thought about coins, like the Galleons Hermione used to use to remind them of DA meetings, but he didn't think that was a good idea in this case. The werewolves didn't seem to use money much, and he wasn't exactly paying for their services. He wanted everyone to understand what was happening here, and also what _wasn't _happening here.

"This is yours," he said, handing Grass the book with the gold-tinted cover. "And this one is yours," he added, and the silver one went to Wind.

Grass flicked through hers, and raised her eyebrows at the blank pages. "We are supposed to write in here?" she asked. "Or your orders will appear?"

Harry couldn't restrain a shudder at the last suggestion, which made Laughter peer at him. Harry gave him a quick smile, but he thought it would be too complicated to try and explain about Tom Riddle's diary at the moment. "No," he said. "They'll grow warm if I want to talk to you, and I'll have one, too." He picked up another grass blade and Transfigured it into a book with a bronze cover. "Mine will grow warm if you want to talk to me. And the cover will flash different colors if one of us is in danger. Other than that, these are ordinary books. Keep them and do whatever you want with them."

Grass glanced at him, but said nothing. Wind murmured, "This sounds more like a gift than a marking."

Harry raised his eyebrows and tried for haughty. After all, it seemed to serve both Draco and Severus well, even if Severus didn't spend much of his time negotiating with werewolves. "And that's not a bond between two people? Two parts of the alliance?" That was probably the better phrasing, considering it was three people in this case.

"No, it will work," Grass said, and then stood up and looked him fully in the face. "But most people wouldn't give werewolves this and think it was enough to stop the werewolves from attacking them. Most of them would want a mark of some kind that could act as a leash."

"You're not dogs," Harry snapped, before he could think. He heard Draco suck in a harsh breath beside him.

There was a long, teetering pause when things could probably have gone badly in a number of ways, and then Grass smiled and shook her head. "We are not," she said. "Thank you for remembering that." She turned around and said something quietly to Wind. He stood up, holding his own book, and gave a small bow to Harry.

"I accept the gift, and shall keep the book," he said. "As long as you do the same thing to yours."

"And I will keep mine," Grass said. "Conditional on the same promise."

"I will keep mine," Harry said, although he couldn't imagine what they thought might happen if somebody got rid of theirs, or _why _he would want to get rid of his. "And please let me know if you need me."

"You were concerned about spending too much of your time and energy on the alliance with nothing in return, and now you are offering to spend more and more of those things on two werewolves you didn't know ten minutes ago?" Laughter looked at him in what Harry thought was strained patience. "I begin to think that you create most of your own problems with sacrifices and gifts yourself."

Draco winced for a different reason, but Harry found that he could smile. "Some of them I do," he agreed. "Others happen because I make bargains too easily, or think that I'm ready for something I'm not ready for. I might as well grant someone who's going teach me equal consideration, though."

Laughter said nothing, but Harry knew that he might speak with Grass and Wind when they'd left. That didn't concern him. As long as Grass and Wind wanted to obey Laughter, they would. Harry's main concern was not forcing someone to do something they didn't want to, at this point. Thera had chosen to be bound to him. Grass and Wind had accepted their gifts. If he became like Severus, making Ashborn, he would not be able to stand it.

"Now," Laughter said, and turned to Draco, "I believe that I owe you some information about the merfolk and Mermish."

As the conversation turned, and Grass and Wind faded into the ranks of the pack again, Harry gratefully stepped away and leaned against a tree. The pressure of the attention on him, hundreds of eyes, had made him feel as if he was about to step off a cliff. Now he got the chance to watch Draco as negotiator, and that was much more to his taste than doing ancient pure-blood things he still didn't always understand in front of an audience.

He saw part of the reason that Draco was a good negotiator at once: he had picked up on the trick of giving the person he was looking at his whole attention. That was the kind of thing Harry had only seen him doing to Severus, when he first came to the Ashborn.

_Not that I don't have evidence of how he can pay attention to other people. _Harry shifted and felt his elbow brush the tree, waking a remembrance of Draco's warm body. He shivered.

He found himself going over what Laughter had said in his head, and smiling. What would he want to learn how to do? Maybe not fighting, since he'd had more than enough for one lifetime, and maybe not cooking; that reminded him a lot of his chores at the Dursleys', and he really wanted to stop thinking about them if he could.

But forging metal sounded interesting. Harry had seen a few dwarfs working forges on the Horcrux hunt, and what impressed him was the way they could just keep their arms rising and falling for hours, and lose themselves in the metal and the heat and the endless physical labor.

_Something like that might be good for me. And if I can't decide what I should do or be right away, that doesn't matter, because I have all the time in the world to make that decision._

For the first time in weeks, Harry found himself smiling as he thought about the future, and more than just because he was anticipating being with Draco or Severus. This alliance might work out after all.

* * *

"I have discovered how I can see into the minds of the Ashborn before I free them."

Severus had anticipated more silence, or more noise, when he made his announcement. And if Harry had been there, he would have jerked his head up from his breakfast and paid Severus all the attention he could have wished: gaping mouth and fork suspended in midair over his eggs.

Draco took another bite of the porridge that he had requested, for some strange reason, that morning, and shook his head. "That's good, but I think you should test it some more," he said vaguely, and turned to another page in his book.

Severus narrowed his eyes. "What do you mean? Why should I, when the potion works perfectly?"

"I know Harry gave you a memory for the potion before he went away to the Burrow," Draco said, and lifted a spoonful of porridge to his mouth that never made it, he was so split in his attention between his book and the conversation with Severus. "But you haven't tested it with a memory from an Ashborn yet, have you?"

Frowning, Severus shook his head. He wanted Draco to _look_ at him; if he spoke aloud, it would give him too much chance to remain immersed in the book.

But Draco had perhaps seen the gesture from the corner of his eye, and kept his head bowed as a consequence. "Then you haven't seen what the potion does with the memory from a person who's been enslaved under Legilimency and the Mark for years," he said, and let his tongue slide, slurping, down the spoon. Severus winced and set his teeth, but Draco either didn't see that part or didn't care. "Harry hasn't. You ought to test it on the kind of minds that you're actually going to be working with, not someone who's free and contributed the memory willingly."

Severus sat still, and spent a few moments staring at the remnants of his own breakfast, counting the crumbs and studying their neat arrangement, before he could bring himself to do something other than snarl.

He knew Draco was right. With most experimental potions, he would have gone through several trials after he managed to brew them, because there was no reason to ruin his lab or poison himself through mere impatience. But the thought of Harry watching him with judgmental eyes for as long as the Ashborn remained enslaved had made him rush, had made him think that he must get finished as soon as possible, had made him…

Careless.

He looked up to find Draco watching him, and knew Draco understood at least half of what he would have spoken without saying anything, because Draco knew more about potions than Harry did and understood the importance of testing experimental theory. Draco shook his head and reached out to grip Severus's hand, and Severus allowed it to open, rather than keeping his fingers clenched to shut out Draco's touch.

"No," Draco said softly, to him. "I don't mean to ignore you, and I don't think Harry does, either. But Harry has to stay at the Burrow a little while longer; Harry _wants _to stay at the Burrow a little while longer. And I want to make sure that Incognita and I speak to the werewolves and the centaurs while the images and the ideas are fresh in our minds. Hesitate too much, and we might never get the merfolk into the alliance. Someone will come up with some idea that they think is a good reason not to, and that will result in years of protracted negotiations."

"Do you not wish to wait and test the waters, instead of rushing ahead?" Severus said dryly.

Draco flushed, which made Severus feel a bit more as though his lover had not entirely grown up and left him behind in the space of a short month. "Not what I meant," Draco said. "I'm not opposed to reasoned arguments, but these are old grudges that don't have any basis in the present alliance. They just want to bring up things from the past and rehash them again and again." A shadow seemed to pass across his face, and he paused, swallowed, then added, "You know. The way you and I and Harry liked to."

Severus nodded, and stood up from the table. "Then I will test the potion, and wait until Harry returns to use it. Merlin knows that I must get used to not being the focus of attention for a while."

Draco gave him a brilliant smile and leaned over to kiss him, but didn't actually contradict the statement, or reassure Severus that he would always be the center of attention to _him_, as he might have done several months back. The next moment, in fact, he finished the porridge with a snap of his spoon and rushed away from the table, only coming back for the book a moment later.

Severus watched the breakfast dishes vanish, and wondered who he should take the memory from. Perhaps not Bellatrix or Greyback; to be a true test, the memory could not come from someone he had no intention of freeing.

But one of Yaxley's cousins might blame him less for the Dark Lord's demise. Severus had always had the impression that she had followed the Dark Lord only because the majority of her family did, and would rather not have been concerned in it. He stood up with a small smile and retreated towards his lab, summoning Marie Yaxley as he moved. She turned from cleaning up a small side corridor and was waiting at the door of his lab by the time he got there.

_At least some are still obedient to me, _Severus thought, and then reminded himself that he would give that up soon. With few exceptions, the Ashborn would either be free to choose what they wanted or turned over to the Ministry.

Well, he would gain something worth more than the Ashborn from the giving-up of them. And he would enjoy their services while they lasted. At his gesture, Marie preceded him into the lab and shut the door behind him.

* * *

"You do not know what the merfolk did this to us when the old alliance was new."

There was a note of hostility in the back of Kleianthe's voice that made Draco want to sigh. He had the impression that it wouldn't be that productive, though, so he looked at Thera instead and asked with a silent shrug whether she could do anything about Kleianthe's objection.

Thera answered with a flat stare that said he would have to overcome this on his own, the same way he had overcome the objection to the werewolves. And Incognita stood behind him with her arms folded, in another bright robe, blue with silver lace on the sleeves this time. She had already explained her technical expertise, that she had discovered charms that would increase her memory retention and allow her to learn Mermish much faster, and she was on Draco's side.

_I am the one in between, again._

But that thought made his heart pound faster, because it was such a change from the place he had been most often in the past: under. Under his father's rule, under the Dark Lord's control, under Severus's domination. At least things had changed, and if it was left up to Draco, they would change even further. He could influence others now, not merely be subject to their influence.

"Perhaps not, although I have read enough history that you might be surprised by what I know," Draco murmured, leaning forwards. "But I know what Harry did to you in much more recent terms."

Thera watched him, and smiled. Draco ignored her. If she wasn't going to actually interfere and make the conversation with Kleianthe easier, then he didn't want to count on her.

"He apologized." Kleianthe hit the ground with one hoof hard enough to send splashes of mud flying and then turned and stared at the blank walls that surrounded the garden. "We spend too much time cooped up here. I want to run, to roam."

"You are free to do that, of course," Draco murmured, keeping a straight face. "But not until you answer me. What is the difference between what Harry did to you and what the merfolk did to you? Did they break an oath?"

"It is _complicated_," Kleianthe said, sternly enough that her daughter and Thera's stopped playing and looked warily over at them. Draco nodded to them gently. He had got them to trust him a little, enough to sometimes come up and speak to him, but he could hardly blame them for holding back now.

"You can explain it to me," Draco said. "What did you make the alliance with me for, if you find that you cannot trust me as a negotiator?"

Kleianthe shook her head enough that the shake traveled all the way down her body and made her tail bob. "You do not understand the way that we think, or feel, or dream, or speak," she said. "You are not a centaur."

"Neither is Harry," Draco said, and smiled. He was starting to enjoy this. If he looked closely at it, who was the flustered person here? Not him. "Neither are the merfolk. If you are going to shut anyone who is not one of you and therefore must not understand you out of your company, that includes one person you forgave and a whole group you didn't. Have you considered that the modern merfolk are _not _like their ancestors? You could reach out to them and find some who are reasonable."

"That does not happen," Thera said quietly, stamping her own hoof. Draco looked at her and couldn't tell from her face what she felt, but her folded arms made it clear. "The merfolk—they have ways they must act, ways they cannot help acting, that make discussion and truce with them impossible."

"Like it was with the werewolves?" Draco asked her, as quietly.

Thera reared her head back and stared at him. Draco raised his eyebrows and said nothing. For the first time, he felt that he might have surpassed Thera in a feat of diplomatic language, or at least diplomatic action.

"We could not meet with the merfolk in the dreams," Kleianthe said, as if she thought discussing a different subject would throw Draco off. "The dreams resemble physical spaces, or must, enough to convince us to commit to them as mental reality. We know that we cannot breathe underwater. We would wake ourselves, and we could never stay to negotiate with them."

"But I could," Draco said. "With Bubble-Head Charms, or gillyweed, or, oh, another variety of spell." He looked over his shoulder at Incognita, who nodded. Considering that she had been the one looking up the translation charms that would allow her to speed up learning Mermish, he thought that she was probably finding all sorts of spells that would allow a human to remain underwater and learn from them. "Will you trust me?"

"We have no reason to," Kleianthe began.

"You trusted me with the werewolves," Draco said quietly. "I don't think that you would have gone to that truce, or thought one could be arranged at all, without me."

"The situation with the merfolk is even more delicate," Thera said, and edged forwards as though she wanted him to focus on her and not Kleianthe. Draco found that interesting, since Kleianthe looked startled and as though she was coming around to his point-of-view. "The shadow of the old alliance haunts us still."

"More delicate than a negotiation with werewolves who are living right _next to_ your territory?" Draco said, and snorted. "Forgive me, but I'm not sure that I believe that. At all."

Thera moved back and swished her tail through the grass, then lowered her head to crop, the way she had of removing herself from the conversation. Finding herself the sole focus of Draco's attention, Kleianthe took a deep breath, half-bowed her head, and said, "I…can perhaps see that you have some experience now in taking our wishes into account. But you have to know what the merfolk did to us."

"If someone would explain, then I'd be happy to listen," Draco said. He concealed the way he wanted to smirk behind a yawn. He had been trying to maneuver them into talking about this all along, but they had been awfully coy. Perhaps they thought the truth wouldn't make them look all innocence and light, either, at least not to a neutral third party who wasn't a centaur.

"They insulted us," Kleianthe said. "Called us a lesser part of the alliance, and took things that we could have done—such as gazing at the stars—away from us."

Draco frowned and cocked his head. "But don't you still watch the stars, and govern your lives by them, and draw predictions from them? How could they have taken that gift from you when you still have it?"

Kleianthe sighed a little and bowed her head until her hair swept the ground. "It is—complicated. Suffice it to say that we wished to read the stars for the others in the alliance, and the merfolk used their own method of predicting the future to become the guides that everyone turned to."

Draco stared at her in fascination, then said, "So…the merfolk insulted you by doing something better than you could do it?"

Kleianthe gave her head a haughty toss, reminding Draco of a winged horse his father had once owned who would permit no bridle. "No. They did it in a different way, and we could have read the stars better. Faster. More efficiently. But the others in the alliance preferred to listen to the merfolk, because they were convinced that their way was more mystical. More magical. The members of the old alliance often wished to believe that they were in touch with the pure force of magic, whether they were or not. They thought it separated them more from Muggles."

Draco thought of that, and winced. He hoped he could keep that, to some extent, from Harry, who would not be at all pleased at the thought that the old alliance had pure-blood prejudices stuck in from the beginning.

_Don't lie to him. But explain that it was a pure-blood society, and that that makes things different._

Kleianthe stirred, and Draco reminded himself not to wander too far away in his thoughts, lest the centaurs interpret his silence as insulting. "Okay. How about this, then? You'll begin to read the future for us, right here. For me and the werewolves and the others in the alliance. For Harry, when he comes back. That means that you'll already be doing it when the merfolk join in, and they can't take your place."

Kleianthe stared at him. Then she said, "You would accept such a thing?"

"Why not?" Draco asked. "Have you known pure-bloods who wouldn't?"

"More pure-bloods who thought of us as animals, and not worth speaking to," Thera said quietly, drifting into the conversation. "Half of what we say to them is designed to hold them back, in any case, and baffle them into not inquiring further."

Draco thought of the way centaurs such as Firenze tended to speak, all distant riddles and references to the planets, and nodded. "I can see that. But no, I think of you as allies. Please speak to me. Read my future, and then that of others."

Kleianthe crossed the grass to take his hand. Her steps were slow and weighty, her gaze on him heavy and wondering. But Draco simply watched her, and waited, and it was no problem at all not to shudder when she touched him, although he knew one of his parents would have hated it.

Kleianthe bowed her head. "What are your birth stars?"


	38. The Future Unwritten

Thank you again for all the reviews!

_Chapter Thirty-Eight—The Future Unwritten_

"Are you ready to go back, then?"

Harry smiled at Hermione and stroked Shield's head where he stood with his neck wrapped around Harry's and his head dangling down in the middle of his chest. Shield's claws sank deep into his shoulder, but Harry had solved that problem by Transfiguring his shirts to have a little more padding there. They were back on good terms, which meant Shield had forgiven Harry for leaving the Ashborn fortress without telling him where he was going and was no more than _usually _paranoid.

"Yes," Harry said simply. "I wanted some time away from Severus and Draco to visit with you, and Ron, and Ginny, and the rest of the family, but I'm ready to go back now."

Hermione grinned at him. "And I reckon it has nothing to do with Bill and Fleur coming over for a visit in a little while?"

Harry shuddered despite himself. He had never disliked Fleur the way that Ginny and Mrs. Weasley had for a little while, but now that she was pregnant, she had enough discomforts for three armies and a pressing need to tell you what color her vomit had been that morning. "Only about ten percent of it," he said. "The other ninety percent is that I miss them and I want to see how they're getting on."

"Afraid they might change their minds without you there?"

Harry blinked. Of all the things that Hermione might reckon were his reason, he hadn't thought of that one. "Change their minds about what?"

"About having you as a lover." Hermione watched him, leaning forwards with her elbows on her knees and her hands propped beneath his chin. "I mean, they were lovers, by themselves, for an awfully long time. And they're more like each other than they are like you."

Only the knowledge that Hermione was trying to do good, as she saw it—warning Harry of all the problems so that they wouldn't surprise and disappoint him later—kept Harry from snapping at her. He sighed and nodded. "Yeah, sometimes I think about that. But all they'd have to do is tell me they were tired of me, and I can't see Severus keeping that from me even if Draco wanted to. Then I would leave."

"And come back here?" Hermione half-lifted her head. "I thought the Unbreakable Vows you made prevented you from doing that."

Harry shook his head. "They say that I can't attack Severus or Draco or the Ashborn, that I have to discuss the timing of my next visit to you with Severus, and that I won't stay away visiting you for more than a month. They say nothing at all about what happens if I go somewhere and it's not to you."

Hermione blinked. "Really?"

Harry snorted. "I spent hours arguing with Severus over the wording, and any loopholes that might come up with his Vows, too. I should know what they say."

Hermione hesitated, then said, "Then nothing really binds you to them."

"Except that I want to be bound," Harry said quietly. "You could argue that Severus isn't bound to do anything, either, since he's already freed Incognita and he's shown no sign of wanting to attack you, Ron, or me anyway. But he's still going through and doing things he doesn't have to, like considering freeing all the Ashborn and consulting with me about the fates of the ones he frees who are too dangerous for him to just let roam around the fortress. This isn't about Vows anymore, Hermione. I don't think it was from the first moment that I started taking Draco and Severus seriously as—potential lovers."

"But they're not always your friends," Hermione said, her eyes bright and shrewd.

"Is Ron always _your _friend, come to that?" snapped Harry, a little sick of the interrogation, even if he knew that Hermione was doing it because she was concerned for his happiness. "I don't think that you always got along when we were on the Horcrux hunt. And I remember that time you cursed him not to speak for a week."

Hermione's cheeks paled. Then she murmured, "He—never called me the names that Malfoy did."

"And Draco never called me _those _names, either." Harry shook his head and stood up. "He called me different things, and I've decided to overlook them until or unless he does something else unforgivable. You don't have to like him, Hermione. I don't think he likes you, either. But I'm going home to them, and that's it."

Hermione winced and held out her arms. "I don't mean to, Harry," she whispered into his hair, as he came closer and hugged her. "I'm sorry. But I do worry that there's something not quite right about this, you becoming their lover after you were their hostage. Muggles have this disease called—"

"Nothing in my life is bloody normal," Harry interrupted roughly. "I know it's not for you, either, with the war and all, but you and Ron had each other all through it, and normal childhoods, and—just lots of things I didn't, Hermione. For right now, this is what I want. I think what's best is that I know I don't have to stay with Severus and Draco if I don't want to, I'm free to change my mind. Please leave it up to _me _to change it instead of thinking that you need to tell me to all the time."

Hermione gave him a watery smile. "All right, Harry. Are you going to wait for Ron to say good-bye?"

Harry shook his head. "We said it this morning before he left for the Ministry." Ron had gone to see about possibly getting into the Auror training program when this year at Hogwarts and the NEWTs were over. He was a little wary, since the Ministry that had targeted Harry might target him, but on the other hand his father and Percy still worked for them, and Ron really, really wanted to be an Auror. On the whole, Harry thought it was a good idea. Ron had lots of skills he had picked up in the war that could be useful for the Aurors.

"All right." Hermione hugged him one more time, and then stood up and accompanied him to the front of the house. Harry had told her that he preferred to Apparate back to the fortress rather than Floo.

And that was true, at least so he could avoid getting soot on his clothing and dropping it everywhere in his rooms. But he had another reason to want to Apparate today, and it involved doing something for himself.

A private errand.

A wonderful surprise, even if _he _was the only one who would know about it and thus the one receiving the surprise.

* * *

Severus leaned back in the chair and closed his eyes, running a hand over his forehead. Examining the memory he had taken from Marie Yaxley had involved enough exertion to make sweat spring out on his brow, and given him a headache that had taken several vials of Headache Draught to exorcise.

On the one hand, he had to interpret what was going on without knowing any of the players in the drama, the way he had when he'd visited Harry's memory. On the other, the shadow of his own Legilimency lay all over the memory, subtly warping it in various ways. He had forced Marie, as he had all of them, to pay more attention to Severus's own desires than her own emotions, and the effects of that reached back into the past as well as extending into the future. An Ashborn guard upset by the recollection of a death or a time when someone else in the Death Eaters had tried to kill them was an Ashborn who was not serving Severus's needs.

And so he had woven his bonds tight, never thinking the day might come when he might want to pull them off, and needed to see the reality beneath them for that.

With patience and effort, and going through the memory until he knew the faces of the actors better than he knew those of his parents and could repeat every word, he had finally worked the clutching, staggering memories free. And the knowledge had poured into his head, and he had known how Marie's mind had changed under the pressure of his thoughts.

Greatly, as it turned out. He had forced her to stop thinking of herself first and foremost—for she was self-centered in the same mild way that so many Slytherins and pure-bloods were—and pay attention to him instead. He had toughened her spirit, utterly suppressed her distaste for violence, and changed several of the interests, such as Herbology, that she had had before he invaded her mind.

Seeing the changes he had wrought, he had caught a glimpse, for the first time, of the distaste that Harry felt for this sort of mental slavery, where before he had only understood that objection when applied to himself.

That had left him more worn-out than the sheer work he had put in.

He sat up now and shook his head. He could not let the weariness deter him from the work he was _going_ to put in—changing things, altering things, and making sure that he understood the Ashborn's minds well before he ventured into them.

He wondered what Harry would say if Severus told him that Harry had changed Severus more than the other way around. Probably he would laugh. Or he would say that they had changed each other in the same way, with that noble pomposity and claim of equality that Gryffindors so loved.

Severus decided not to say it. He would make the necessary study, do the necessary work, and free Marie, and present it to Harry when he came back as a _fait accompli. _That would do more good in the end towards showing Harry what sacrifices he was prepared to make than all the bragging or hints in the world.

He turned once more to the bowl that brimmed with his potion and cast the spells that would stir the liquid and make it ready to receive a new memory. He had another one that he would add to the mix and test, because he wanted to be sure that he understood the true nature of Marie's mind now and not simply that one memory.

He could not make things perfect for either Harry or Draco when he had helped to malform their lives in the first place, but he could show that he understood now.

* * *

Draco sat by the fire in his rooms, looking thoughtfully into it. Ordinarily, he would have wanted to meet with Incognita by now to know what advice she could offer him on Mermish, but she had asked permission, with a little jerk of her head and a low voice Draco hadn't known she was capable of, to go to her room and think for a while. Draco had of course given it to her. He didn't think she would have asked, except that she was rattled enough by Kleianthe's predictions for her to forget that she wasn't Ashborn anymore.

He understood. He wanted the time alone himself.

The future Kleianthe had read from his stars was more surprising than anything else, and Draco wondered what Harry and Severus would think of it. There would have been a time when Severus would have told him that he wasn't destined for anything half so grand, or smiled with a superior tinge and said nothing, waiting for Draco to give up this idea as he had given up so many in his time. Draco didn't have the concentration and dedication for one subject that Severus had.

But he couldn't imagine what Harry would say, even now and after knowing him so well. Perhaps an explosion.

Draco tapped his wand against the book in his lap, and it closed with a faint trail of red light sticking out from the pages to mark where he had been reading. Draco then stood up and turned to the shelves, seeking out the tomes he had nearly memorized by now, on the old pure-blood alliance and the names of the families who had held to the ancient ways when the rest of them had decided that individual gain was more to their taste.

Yes. Tucked in the first of them was the unfinished letter to Lady Jocelyn, the witch he had thought of asking to bear him a child. Draco traced his fingers over the words on the page, and winced a little at the arrogance that shone through them. He would write this differently now, if he had it to write over again.

And it seemed he would. He closed his eyes and listened to the way that Kleianthe's words beat in his ears like the sea.

_A bright path is yours, curving out before you, touching the stars and beating sparks off them like a smith at the forge. The light illumines your survival of another war, and the children you will have, and the wife you will take, and the lovers you will retain. And you will become known to many, valued by many, though by some as an enemy and some as an ally. You will become more truly the spirit of the old alliance than anyone else, while carrying forwards with the new._

Draco opened his eyes, and shivered. He could see now—though he would never tell Kleianthe—why the wizards of the ancient alliance might have preferred the future-reading methods of the merfolk. They might not be as accurate, but he was sure they would never be half so unsettling.

Well. The old alliance had allowed multiple marriages and love-bonds, and marriages for more than one reason, as well. If he could offer a woman trained in those old ways sufficient reasons to marry him—so that the children might be legitimate—and bear him heirs, then she had no reason to object.

_Severus and Harry might, though._

Draco sighed and bowed his head, letting his fingers tighten around the letter before he ripped it up and cast the pieces in the flames.

He would have to write a better one. And think, too, how he would phrase his desire to have children to Severus and Harry. He was not sure that it was a desire Harry shared, as long as he could live with people who loved him.

And he _knew _it was not one shared by Severus.

With a faint smile on his face that Draco knew would change more than once in the future, he sat down and began to write a different letter.

* * *

"And you're sure that you can pay?"

Harry grinned in spite of himself. He probably didn't make the most prepossessing figure, with Shield on his shoulder and hissing at the woman he'd approached, and the glamour he'd adopted to make his face look utterly ordinary, cover his scar, and cause a general air of shabbiness to hang around his clothing.

"Yes," he said briefly, and reached into his pocket for the bag he'd stopped by Gringotts to get. He'd been half-afraid the Ministry would have seized his vault, but either they knew the bad publicity such a move would bring or it had never occurred to them. The Galleons that spilled across his palm made the dark-haired woman blink a bit and look from his hand to his face.

"Well," she said, after studying him for long enough that Harry thought she might refuse to rent the house to him anyway. "Come in, then."

Harry stepped through the front door and made sure that he noted the slight fall down to the floor. It was plain stone, the flags well-joined but cold, like the dungeon floors in Hogwarts. The windows had thick, hinged wooden shutters on them, linking so close that Harry had to cast a _Lumos _Charm to see anything. The dimness didn't stink, but Harry was tempted to wrinkle his nose anyway. The smell of dust, at least, was thick.

The woman cast a spell that banged the shutters back, and Harry cast another one, nonverbally, that kept him from sneezing or coughing as the dust flew about. That particular spell had been useful more than once when they were hunting Horcruxes or information about them through tunnels and caverns and abandoned houses.

Seen by the light of an actual day—even if Shield _did _huddle closer to Harry's neck as if to hide Harry's vulnerable face and throat behind his wings—the cottage was much nicer than it had appeared from the outside. Harry could see why the woman wanted to rent it, though, since it was too small for the furniture stuffed into it currently. But the walls were sturdy, and there was a corner practically made for a desk, and another one for a bed, and he didn't think the fanciful carvings on the walls or the enchantment on the ceiling that made it reflect the weather like the Great Hall at Hogwarts would be moving with her.

"My parents made this place," the woman said, not moving as she watched Harry turn around in the center of the floor and stare up at the shining ceiling. "It was their fancy to make it look like Hogwarts, it was. Ye've ever been there?"

"When I was in school," Harry said. The glamour he had chosen made him look older than he was. He turned back to her. "I'll take it," he said firmly. "How much a month?"

They spent a long time haggling, long enough that Miss Cherrybuck, as she introduced herself, began to smile. Harry thought she probably enjoyed the challenge of getting her money's worth; she certainly chuckled when she pocketed her Galleons.

"That's fair and kind of you, Mr. Gamson," she said. "And I can move this furniture out of here by the first of next month. Rent to be due on the first, mind."

Harry nodded. He had thought of buying a place first, not renting it, but none of the other houses he could find for sale had been as isolated or private as this cottage, behind its strong wards that he could sense were only temporarily lowered.

After a moment more of looking at him, Miss Cherrybuck stepped outside, and left Harry to stand in the house and glance around, and breathe through the dust, and imagine what it would look like when he'd cleaned it and used some magic to change the colors and put in his own chairs and desk and table and bed.

This was what he wanted. A place for himself, one that no one else knew about, one he could visit when he wanted to escape for a time from the clutching pressure of the Ashborn's fortress and his friends and his lovers. This was what he had never really had for himself. He was always sharing things at Hogwarts, and at "home" he had only had what the Dursleys gave him. And of course, on the Horcrux hunt, they couldn't spend too much time in private or away from each other because something might happen to separate them.

But this…

Harry reached out and rested a hand on the nearest wall, feeling how firm it was beneath all the dirt and grime.

This was his claim on a piece of the future. This was his statement that he was here now, and didn't wish to move.

He thought he could make it a strong one.

* * *

Severus plunged among shadows.

He could feel them curling around his ankles as if they were thick, cold dark water, and he kicked out against them. He would survive them and reach his goal. Rivers could come against him, and it would not alter his determination.

He touched something more solid, but it broke apart beneath his feet when he tried to lean on it. He grunted and began to wade again, picking the shadows apart as he went. They felt familiar to his hands, as if he had woven them himself. Which he had, though not in the form of shadows.

He stepped up onto the one solid bank he could find and turned, swaying his wand out over the water around him. He heard it stop rushing, and Severus closed his eyes and began to push back the slavery he had established here, one slow, hard step at a time.

The bank sloped beneath him, and tried to throw him, wickedly. The ground shook under his feet when that wasn't enough, and the shadows came flowing back, whispering to him in familiar voices, telling him how _good _it would feel to have those who despised him fetching and carrying for him, and acting as his guards and protectors far more faithfully than they had ever acted for the Dark Lord.

Severus smiled faintly. He recognized those words, too. He should, when they had whispered in his head as he changed the Dark Marks and claimed the Ashborn for his own.

He found another bank, another rough, uneven patch in Marie Yaxley's mind, and knelt down so that he could sink his hands deep into the sand and get his bearings. The heavy and cold water still swirled around his ankles, still tried to throw him. Severus closed his eyes and bowed his head.

He had enough strength to do this. He had traveled far enough in Yaxley's bound mind to understand how the slavery had changed her, and that meant he knew what the original contours beneath the shadows and darkness looked like. It was simply mustering the enormous effort that made him hesitate.

And there was part of him, even now, that whispered he didn't _need _to do this, that Harry would _understand _if Severus wanted to wait, that it was his own self-imposed burdens that had brought him here, and no need.

Severus grimaced and shook his head, and stood.

No, there was not a need. There had not been a need for very much, since the war.

But there was a _desire. _And Severus's desire was to have both Draco and Harry beside him because they wanted to be, rather than because of lust or craving for the company of someone who understood what the war had done. As long as the Ashborn remained, they were a barrier to that desire, in the same way that the existence of the Dark Lord had been a barrier to Severus's own desire to brew quietly.

He took a step forwards.

The darkness hovered above him, and tried to fall on him.

But Severus had thought carefully, and deprived the darkness of the ally it might have had in his own mind, the old yearning for absolute peace and absolute freedom from any kind of responsibility. He had chosen to enslave the Ashborn. That meant responsibility. He had chosen to have sex instead of keeping to himself. That was an alteration of peace. And he had chosen to make the Ministry afraid of him, to swear Unbreakable Vows, to negotiate for the end of a war instead of fight it.

All of those were choices.

_And who acts is responsible._

Severus thought it was something Albus had said to him once, but in the middle of his battle, he could not remember.

And it did not matter. As long as he fought it.

* * *

"Grass and Wind tell me that they have not yet received a summons from Potter."

Draco held Laughter's eyes and shrugged. "We haven't heard where he is yet, either. I think he had business of his own to take care of."

"And does he know that no business is truly private, now that he is part of the alliance?"

Draco found himself smiling. "I'm good at spotting when you try to make me angry now," he said. "It's not going to work."

Laughter paused before he said, "I do not know why I would wish to make you angry."

"Private business is still private," Draco said, watching Laughter intently. "I don't ask about the internal affairs of the pack when we speak, because when I tried, you snapped at me." It had been a literal snap, the kind that Draco thought Laughter would use if Draco had ever visited him in wolf form, and he had no desire to repeat the experience.

Laughter looked at him with no expression. "But you would have the right to object if I was leading the pack in such a fashion that it had a negative impact on my allies."

"I've studied the old alliance," Draco said, and watched the muscles around Laughter's golden eyes contract a little. Well, let them. Draco thought someone should stand up to Laughter now that he was pushing for so much more. "It was _flexible_. If someone did something wrong, there were ways to negotiate the mistake, or punish one for it, or shun someone for a time until the consequences of being without their allies made them change their mind. Different possible solutions in all those cases. I think it's much the same way with me and Harry. There are _different _ways of being your ally, and there's no reason that he has to give up all his time and privacy to you any more than I do. You're only pushing to see what you can get away with, what I'll do if you say things like that. I don't find it impressive, and I wish you would stop. But since I realize that you might not want to, I'll simply answer that Harry is his own person, and trying to force him to do what you want would make him leave. You must have realized that yourself, after the way that you gave him gifts and let him answer with a gift instead of a mark. You're less committed to traditional practices than you like to pretend."

Laughter carried on staring at him when Draco had finished speaking, so steadily that Draco wondered for a moment if he had gone too far. But he really didn't think so. Laughter had invested too much time in Draco, and personal praise, and risks, to push him away simply because Draco didn't respond in the "right" way to one of his little tests.

Then Laughter dipped his head, and laughed quietly, the deep chuckle that Draco knew had earned him his name, and the pressure in the middle of Draco's chest eased. Laughter sat back in the grass, folding his arms in front of him and his legs beneath him in that lupine sprawl that Draco couldn't imitate even in his dreams.

"Yes, you are right," Laughter said. "Having allies like you and Potter is more important than enforcing my will. But there are those among my people who think that Potter should already have taken advantage of the gift I gave him, and are wondering and indignant that he has not. I had to say something to satisfy them, and when I return your clever answer to them, I think they will back off."

Draco nodded. He had sometimes wondered what it would be like to be a leader, the way that Severus had been, or his father in the Ministry, or Laughter was among the werewolves, and his main conclusion at the moment was that it was too tiring to be worthwhile. He would earn more respect in the position of a negotiator that he had chosen—or had forced upon him, he was not sure which.

"Have you yet contacted the merfolk?" Laughter asked, brisk now and with his hands relaxing in front of him.

Draco shook his head. "There's been no time, what with you summoning me to dream meetings and dealing with the centaurs."

"Do it soon," Laughter said, and flopped back on his side with a yawn. "It will show those who doubt you that you can do something concrete, and I have the feeling that it will also reassure _you_."

"No doubt," Draco said dryly. "Now. Was there anything else that you wanted to discuss?"

Laughter fixed him with a hard stare and said, "Perhaps why you feel that you can be so cheeky to me, without a good cause."

"It's a good cause," Draco said, and leaned back with a sigh. "A few months ago, I wouldn't have dared to be like this, because a few months ago, there was nothing I wanted more than to remain in a null state for the rest of my life, doing research and serving as Severus's slave when he wanted me. But Harry woke me up, and life woke me up. I can't go back to what I was now."

"I am glad," Laughter said softly, and Draco, staring into his eyes for a moment before he remembered the aggression that might cause and looked away, thought he really was.

* * *

Harry slipped into the Ashborn's fortress without anyone noticing. The wards were tuned to him, after all, and there was nothing to prevent him from Apparating into the small garden where Severus had once forced him to meet with his friends and walking down the corridors towards his rooms.

Shield took off from his shoulder and flew around him, clapping his wings and crooning. Harry laughed up at him. "Yes, I know that you're delighted I'm back in a place where you can protect me more easily," he muttered. "Good for you."

"Harry."

Harry almost didn't recognize the voice at first, it was so thin and thready. He turned and saw Severus leaning against the wall behind him. Of course; Harry had forgotten that this corridor led past his lab.

There was a long moment when Harry thought both of them were afraid to move first, and then Harry stepped forwards and laid his hands gently on Severus's arms. Severus stared at him and stuck out a finger to capture a strand of Harry's hair, trailing it gently over his skin.

"You're all right?" Harry asked, and had to make it a question rather than the statement that he thought Severus would have preferred, because he looked so absolutely broken-down. Severus met his eyes and snorted. He stood taller and tossed his hair back, which made Harry realize that it looked greasier and dirtier than it had since Harry had come to the fortress.

"Yes," Severus said. "I understand now that the minds of the Ashborn have changed under the domination I exert over them with Legilimency, and how. I have finished freeing one of them, a Yaxley cousin."

Harry frowned. "Was that a good idea? I know how much Yaxley hated you." Yaxley had been dropped off at the Ministry the other day, with the information that might have allowed the Ministry to find an entrance to the fortress carefully _Obliviated. _Harry hadn't known that Severus planned to choose another member of the same family for freeing next.

"Yes, it was a good idea," Severus said, and his voice deepened. "This Yaxley is like Incognita. She knows that the world at large would not welcome her for having been a Death Eater, and while she hates me, she is not against having me provide her with food and a place to sleep while she makes up her mind about where to go next."

Harry nodded, satisfied. He wanted the Ashborn free, but having them free if the only thing they decided to do was attack Severus was good for no one, in the end. Severus would potentially be in danger, and they were all the more likely to end up in Ministry cells.

"I gave her a room near Incognita's," Severus continued. "I hope their company will encourage them to come up with new plans and new desires, in time."

Harry nodded. "Why _did _you make this place so huge?" he asked, to satisfy a curiosity he hadn't thought about much before. "It's not as though you and Draco and the Ashborn needed that much room."

Severus paused as though caught more off-guard by the question than by Harry seeing him without his mask on, and then shrugged and said, "When I was young, I lived in a small house, with parents who were poor and could not get me the best of anything even when they wished to provide me with it. That included space. And my quarters at Hogwarts and at my house remained small as I aged. I decided that, if I ever reached the point where I was the master of my own existence once more, I was going to make sure I had a lot of room."

"Oh," Harry said, barely exhaling. He trailed a finger through the stubble on Severus's jaw and shook his head.

"What is the matter?" Severus said, and his voice clanged as he drew himself upright against the wall. "That explanation is not _deep _enough for you? You must think that you—"

"Please, Severus, stop," Harry said, and met his eyes. Severus shut up, perhaps as much in surprise as anything else, and blinked at him. Harry shook his head. "No. I meant that I didn't think you would ever tell me even that much. Thank you for doing so."

Severus grunted, and looked away. Harry thought it was much harder for him to smooth his hackles down than raise them.

"What? You're back and I don't get so much as a kiss?"

Harry turned around with a smile, and watched as Shield craned his neck down and waggled his wings in salute to Draco—who looked even more poised and proud and adult than Harry had seen him during the dream meeting in Laughter's clearing. Draco stepped forwards, one hand reaching out to rest on Severus's shoulder, one on Harry's, and pulled them close enough to kiss.

Harry kissed him, and then pulled back so that he could do the same thing to Severus. Severus's mouth was rough, chapped, dry, and his breath had a faint sour taint to it that made Harry wonder why he'd needed to swallow so many Headache Draughts. Draco's tongue darted out to welcome Harry's at once, and his mouth was warm and sweet and swallowing. Harry shuddered and leaned closer to him, moving his hands to grip his shoulders and trembling with the force of the kiss. Draco pulled him closer, then turned him around so that Harry's back rested against Severus's chest. Severus's hands fell to rest on Harry's hips, and they held him between them as they kissed him; Severus's lips brushed through his hair, inches away from the fingers Draco stuck there to cradle his head.

It was all-enveloping, and fascinating, and _good_. Harry ached long before Draco pulled his head away and murmured into his ear, "Shall we show you how much we missed you?"

Harry rocked backwards to test Severus's readiness before he replied. He didn't want to do this without Severus, he wanted both of them fine and fit and ready before they did anything—

But Severus's hands seized his hips again, and Severus kissed him hard enough to leave Harry dazed when he did try to reply.

"Oh, yes," he said, and saw Severus smile at the weakness of his voice. "Oh, _yes_, please."


	39. Sharing

Thank you again for all the reviews!

_Chapter Thirty-Nine—Sharing_

Harry took them to his bedroom this time.

Severus made a noise low in his throat as he stared around the room, seeming to notice the smallness and the crowded condition of the furniture for the first time. Or perhaps he was only distressed by the way that Harry had chosen to decorate the walls with the murals and colors of his choice.

"Fuck it, we're doing it here," Harry said firmly, and reached for the buttons on his robes. Shield landed on his shoulder and stared at him, and Harry stared back, raising his eyebrows. Shield finally bowed his head, rubbed it against Harry's cheek as though encouraging him, and then turned and soared towards a shelf in the stone, high on the wall. Harry nodded. He didn't mind Shield being in the same room with them, since he wasn't really an animal but more a creature of magic and the soul-bond, as long as he didn't try to interfere because he thought Severus or Draco would hurt Harry.

_Which they might._

Harry shrugged his way out of his robes. The voice in his head sounded like Hermione, and that was enough reason not to listen to it.

Draco was already halfway out of his shirt, struggling with it, his face bright and breathless, his eyes fastened on Harry's. Harry laughed gently at him. "Anyone would think that we hadn't seen each other naked before," he said.

"It's not the same thing, and you know it," Draco said. "You've been with us once, and you chose to come back."

Harry snorted. "And it seems that we can't be away from each other for long without wanting to fuck again." He turned to Severus, only to see his pale arse as he bent down and folded his clothes neatly up at his feet. Harry stared in spite of himself, and then began tearing at his clothes. Not only was he behind both Severus and Draco in undressing speed, he was starting to feel too hot to wear robes at all.

"That doesn't matter," Severus said, standing up and turning around so that he could study Harry with a careful eye. "Unless you want it to matter. And then it will."

Harry had to shake his head when he saw the lines deepening around Severus's eyes and on his forehead. "No. I don't want—what you're thinking I want. I want to have sex with you again. I want to know what that's like. And I want to wake up beside you, and learn what trivial things you say in your sleep, and what you eat for breakfast, and what happens when you drool. You must, you know," he added, watching the way that Severus's eyes deepened and darkened. "Everyone does, and you're only human."

"What about me?" Draco leaned into Harry's line of vision and gave him a sweet smile that didn't quite hide the dozens of sharp teeth. "Are you going to tell me that _I _drool, too? Me, the vision of Malfoy perfection?"

"Yes, I bloody well am," Harry said, and shot a hand out, gripping Draco's hair and plunging him into a kiss.

It was a thick kiss, which Harry hadn't planned on but wasn't going to reject. He bit Draco's lower lip, and when Draco opened his mouth with a gasp, Harry slipped his tongue into it. Draco gave way gracefully before him, leaning against the wall and moaning freely.

Severus came up on the side and stood watching them, without any emotion in his eyes other than desire. Harry lifted his mouth off Draco's at last, gasped in air, and then turned and tried to kiss him in the same way.

It became clear immediately that he wasn't going to do the same thing here. Severus fought back, despite the way his hands trembled as he reached up to cup Harry's cheeks—and Harry honestly wasn't sure whether that was exhaustion or longing. His tongue dipped and scraped around Harry's, and tasted the back of his teeth. Then Severus pulled it forwards again in a slow, delicious tug that made Harry groan and arch into him, reaching out a hand for Draco that he felt clasped and taken, but unable to look away from Severus right now.

Draco kissed Severus's cheek, and then reached out and forcibly took Severus from Harry. Harry laughed in the back of his throat and fell back a step, lifting a hand when Severus tried to look at him as if he thought that Harry would disapprove. Harry was still wearing his pants, he realized; he'd forgotten to tear them off when he was doing it with the rest of his clothes. He took them off, and sat down on his bed, looking eagerly back and forth between them.

"I want to see you kiss," he said. "I didn't get to see so much of that, last time, and you must know each other pretty well."

"He knows my _body_," Draco said, and turned his head back over his shoulder, the expression on his face coy.

Of course, the way he was standing, he couldn't see the expression on Severus's face. For a moment, Severus looked genuinely stricken. Harry smiled gently at him, and Severus seemed to take heart; his fingers rose and skimmed Draco's shoulders, towards his collarbone.

"That is more than true," he murmured. "And shall I show him what one can do with a knowledge of your body, Draco?"

Draco jerked, his hips snapping back and forth, his mouth opening in a moan. He turned around to face Severus again, and his lips remained parted. He focused his eyes on Severus's, and Harry didn't know what was passing back and forth between them, a silent conversation or silent commands, silent pleas.

He could have felt left out. He didn't. He reached down and gripped his cock, and stifled a gasp. He thought that making noise now would draw Severus and Draco's attention to him, and he didn't want that. He wanted to see them together, how they touched, how they moved.

He thought it was the only way he would ever come to truly understand _them._

Severus was bending Draco backwards now, his hands settling into place with insistent precision on Draco's hips, his breath escaping him in soft, panting groans as he bit at Draco's lips and nipped at his chin. Draco laughed, but it sounded breathless, too, and he was walking backwards step by step, his chest heaving as his hands flailed and sought a place to rest. Finally Severus backed him into the opposite wall and kept him pinned there as he kissed him intently, his eyes closed.

_He kisses like it's his job, _Harry thought, and smiled, and touched himself lightly now and then, because there was no reason to hurry this and make himself spill before someone else could touch him.

But that was the intensity that was part of Severus, Harry reckoned. Whether it was brewing or freeing the Ashborn or kissing a lover, he would do it at the same pace and with the same concentration as long as it held his attention. It had been when Draco lost Severus's attention that things began to decay between them.

_That is not going to happen again, _Harry silently resolved to himself, and drew one finger down the middle of his cock in a way that made him gasp.

Perhaps because Severus thought Harry had been left out of the action for quite long enough, he stopped kissing Draco for the moment and turned around to consider him. Harry tried to smile in a way that would make him appealing and winsome, but he thought he was probably too eager for that. Certainly Severus laughed quietly to himself as if he found it so, and moved towards Harry with a stalking grace that said he knew how much Harry would welcome it.

"I think, this time," he whispered against Harry's ear, when he had finally reached the bed and Harry was on edge with the excitement ringing through him, "that you should fuck and be fucked both at once. You would like that, would you not? You would prefer a cock up your arse and an arse to receive your cock at the same time."

"How do you have any idea about what I like?" Harry asked, cursing the shakiness of his voice even as he spoke. He hadn't known he would sound like _that_.

On the other hand, from the way Severus's eyes dilated, perhaps he liked "that" instead of thinking Harry was silly for it.

"I did not," Severus said then, his words drilling through the air between them like a cold wind. "I made a lucky guess, and the way you responded told me you did."

Harry licked his lips, unable to help himself. He saw Draco stepping up to the bed behind Severus, stretching his arms over his head and turning his head to the side as if he wanted to show off the curve of his neck and the line of his jaw to Harry, who already knew perfectly well what he looked like.

"I think," Draco said, "that I would like to be the one with his cock in my arse."

Harry licked his lips again, and Severus laughed, not in a mocking manner but in a way that made it sound as if he were very satisfied with himself. "Yes," he said. "I think Harry agrees." He reached out and placed his hands on Harry's shoulders, holding him there as he peered into his eyes.

Harry tensed for a moment, thinking that Severus was trying to use Legilimency on him, but he didn't feel the familiar pressure against the shields of his mind. After a moment, he understood. Severus was giving him the chance to resist this, to say that he wasn't okay with it and he wanted to do something else. Harry was the one with the decision-making power in this situation. He had only to use it.

Harry reached up, took Severus's hands in his, and held them up to his lips. He kissed the long, slender fingers and nodded.

"Good," Severus said, his voice hoarse with emotions that Harry wasn't going to try to identify, and moved backwards. He turned to Draco. "Then, will you prepare yourself, and him?"

* * *

Draco inclined his head, determined to hold a facial expression that would somewhat hide the wonder beating through him. Most of the time, Severus would not have _asked _him something like that. He would have _demanded. _And Draco would have given in, overawed by him as he had been before he learned better and started taking his place in the alliance.

Before Harry came.

Draco Summoned the lube with a motion of his wand and knelt down on the bed next to Harry, smiling at him. "Are you all right with lying here for a while so I can prepare both of us?" he whispered. "You could get up and move around if you wanted, but it would be a little awkward."

Harry blinked, and then smiled. "Of course I am. Do what you need to do."

If Severus had learned trust, Draco thought as he poured some of the thick oil into his hands and then began to rub them so that the oil heated up, Harry had learned random acts of grace towards Slytherins he had formerly distrusted. Or maybe the ability to do that had been there all along, and it was just the people Harry was expressing it towards that were new.

Harry lay there, looking up at him with quite but intense green eyes, and Draco decided that last thought of his was the right one. Harry's friends had probably always known this side of him, burning and generous and surprisingly needy in some ways, but Draco and Severus were only getting to see it now.

Draco bent down and kissed Harry as he thought about that, and Harry laughed in surprise, reaching up to hook an arm around Draco's neck to prolong the kiss. "I thought you wanted me to lie still," he murmured against Draco's lips as he started to pull back. "It's going to be hard enough doing that when you really start preparing me, without you doing extra things like _that_."

Draco just grinned and refused to apologize. He thought Harry would be all right with that. He rubbed his hands once more, judged the oil was warm enough, and arched over Harry so he could reach back behind himself.

He had often done this, but always with Severus sitting in a chair and watching, or sitting on a bed and watching, and often looking bored, as though Draco would have to put on a performance for him before he would be intrigued. Draco could feel Severus's hot eyes on him now, and Harry's slowly widening, comprehending ones, and that made what he was doing wonderful in a way it had never been. He arched his back and groaned as his fingers slid into himself, and then brought his arse down in a quick jab he had always liked and did to himself when he was alone. His fingers slid all the way in, and he rested for a moment, head hanging, getting used to having them there.

Then he looked up and at Severus first, who had himself firmly in hand and was stroking with the languid motions of a man who didn't intend to come yet, possibly not for a long time. Draco made sure to absorb the sight and to let Severus see that he appreciated it before he turned back to Harry.

Harry's jaw was dropped, and his eyes were fastened on Draco's fingers as if he couldn't believe that someone would willingly touch himself _there_. He started to move his head to the side to get a better view before he caught on that Draco was watching him and jerked his eyes up guiltily. Draco shook his head and murmured to soothe the guilt before he went to work again, this time with three fingers, stroking into himself and feeling the sensation rise and burn through him, the way that the orgasm would when he was ready to have it.

Harry checked his face a few more times, but eventually forgot about doing that and just watched Draco's hand. His tongue was continually in motion, licking his lips and then the inside of his mouth as if his inability to breathe was drying it out. His hand moved down and gripped himself again, but loosely. He'd forgotten about his cock in watching Draco's arse, and Draco was both triumphant and amused when he saw that.

_He'll remember about his cock soon enough._

The angle was too awkward for Draco to reach his own prostate, but that didn't much matter; he knew when he was ready by the looseness of his muscles under his touch, and the impatience that dazzled up and down in his limbs like lightning. He reached out and let his slick fingers touch the head and shaft of Harry's cock.

Harry started, apparently because he had forgotten this was coming, and then looked at Draco and gave the tiniest of nods. Draco leaned over and kissed him again, then made sure that his hand stayed light enough to keep Harry from coming, heavy enough to coat him completely.

And it was…

It was different than it was with Severus. Of course, Draco had known it would be, had plotted and dreamed what it would be, as he lay in his bed last night and played gently with himself until he burst.

But Severus was still the only lover Draco had ever had, and so he hadn't been able to reckon the _ways _it would be different. Harry was nervous in a way Severus never had been, probably because showing his emotions like that would have given away too much information to an enemy. Harry twitched and twisted and murmured apologies and sometimes opened his mouth as if he was going to whisper a secret or describe something in Draco's ear, and his fingers were always rising from the sheets in aborted half-movements. He watched Draco's ears and cheeks as much as his eyes, it seemed, and sometimes he whispered, _Is this okay? And this, and this, and this? _as his fingers traveled some new place.

And Draco liked to nod and bow his head and accept the touches, knowing that he was defining some things for Harry, teaching him how to enjoy someone else in bed.

By the time that he lay back and beckoned Harry to kneel over him, he was burning beneath his skin, with a gentle urgency that would grow worse fast. He hooked his feet behind Harry's knees and tugged, and Harry gave a sharp, short cry as he fell forwards over Draco, blinking at him.

"That's it," Draco whispered. He hoped he would be able to hang onto his _own _impatience throughout this encounter; at the moment, it was hammering in him like wings, threatening to take control of his hands and hurry everything along. He took a long, slow, deep breath that filled his chest with heated air and then dispelled it, and smiled into Harry's eyes as he took his arms. "_Slowly _guide yourself forwards—you have to try and wait, and don't come until after you're—"

"Already inside," Harry whispered, staring down at him, and slowly moving his hips where Draco had directed him, licking his lips again.

And then, Harry smiled. The expression made his face luminous, and Draco stared up at him, enthralled. Harry bent his head down and kissed him, guiding his tongue in careful motions instead of random ones this time, at the same time as his hips found the right place and the right pace. He shuddered a little, paused as if waiting for a signal or listening to a piece of music inaudible to Draco, and then nodded and pushed himself forwards in a single, _incredible _shove.

Draco cried out and levitated off the bed until he nearly knocked chins with Harry. Harry smiled at him, and held him down again, and whispered into his ear, wanting to know if he had hurt him, even as he began to thrust. The motions were the little involuntary ones that Draco had made while Severus was kissing him, and Draco wasn't really worried that they would make Harry come right away. He had something else to worry about instead.

"How did you do that?" he whispered, breathless, licking Harry's jawline as Harry came close enough to kiss. "How did you know that I would like that, if you did it?"

"I reckon I'm not as hopeless about sex as I thought I was, after all," Harry said, and undulated his hips a bit more. "And you're—you're wonderful, Draco, and I thought—I saw something in your face that said you wanted this, if I could do it."

Draco bit his lips and reached up to kiss Harry again, more gently this time. Harry let his tongue twine with Draco's until Draco jerked his head back with the need to breathe, and then Harry turned and looked over his shoulder. The invitation in his eyes was so blatant that Draco groaned and tried as best he could to rub his cock against Harry's stomach.

"Aren't you going to teach me what it's like to have a cock up my arse, Severus?"

* * *

Until that moment, Severus had thought it possible that Harry was playacting. Pretending to be braver than he was, because he did want to seem like the shy, nervous virgin who would ruin everything with his insistence on being slow and gentle. Trying to show them that he could be a good lover even if they had to teach him.

Now, seeing the bright blaze in those green eyes, Severus wondered how much he and Draco might have left to teach Harry.

_Still much, _he cautioned himself, and reached for the lube that Draco had left on the table beside the bed. He touched himself again, directing Harry's gaze to his cock, and Harry nodded when he saw it.

"You realize that this _will _hurt," Severus said. "Unless we used spells that would take some time and generally feel unpleasant. Although perhaps less unpleasant than waking up with a sore arse," he had to added, because Harry's chin was lifted and his eyes were sparking, and Severus did not want him to choose greater pain simply because he was trying to show that he could stand up to what Severus and Draco could bear. They had much more experience than Harry.

_And some of that experience must have been equally painful for Draco to acquire, _Severus had to admit to himself, looking at Draco's flushed face and glazed eyes—an expression he had not always attained when Severus was the one fucking him. Well, Severus had made many a mistake with Draco. He did not wish to repeat them with Harry.

"I know that," Harry said, and jerked his head a little. "I know—I know that you don't want to hurt me. I don't care about that. Damn," he added suddenly, sharply, probably because he had seen the expression like lightning on Severus's face. "I didn't mean—I don't mean that I don't care that you don't want to hurt me." Suddenly he shut his eyes and groaned, and moved his hips a little faster. "Draco, you're not helping," he hissed out of the corner of his mouth.

Draco grinned up at them both, and probably squeezed down again, to judge by the way that Harry began to push into him. "This is silly," he said. "Severus, you don't want to hurt Harry. Harry, you accept that. And Harry, you don't care about the hurt. There. That just proves that, even on my back with one of you inside my arse, I'm still cleverer than either one of you." Severus _was _pleased to note just a touch of breathlessness in his voice as he panted that out, though.

"Yes, you are," Harry said. "And I _want _that hurt, Severus. I want to—feel you. The way I'm feeling him." Sweat was trickling down his cheeks to collect in the corners of his mouth, and his eyes kept fluttering open and shut, as though they were connected to his cock. "The whole thing. I want to share it. Share you."

And Severus could finally bend down and kiss him with full confidence, glad that they had come this far, that they could do this.

Perhaps it was only because of the weariness that plagued him when he had spent so much time today fighting to free Marie Yaxley's mind, but he began to feel as if he had two other heartbeats, one in Draco's body and one in Harry's. His breath came in time with the panting that he heard as Harry began to move faster, because he had no choice, both his body and Draco's demanding it. He could feel the way that they tried to hold back and hurry to their climaxes at the same time, and he anticipated their loud groans when he cast the spell that would help dull the sensations and ease them back from their peaks for a short space.

"Leave time for me," Severus said, and felt the moment when Harry smiled at him and Draco pouted before he looked up.

He eased his fingers into Harry one at a time, pausing when Harry shuddered or pushed backwards or made a slight moan. He did not want to cause him pain, and he did not want to make him concentrate so much on what was happening behind him that he neglected Draco. He leaned forwards and murmured into his ear when Harry had a look of such agonized pleasure on his face that Severus thought he was probably forgetting he was inside someone, as well.

"Do you feel the warmth around you?" Severus whispered. "The way that Draco is _with _you, joined to you? I will feel like that soon."

Harry took the hint and bent down to kiss Draco again. Draco shifted beneath him and spread his legs wide, lifting them so that his knees somewhat brushed Harry's hips and cradled them. Harry smiled and gripped Draco's legs to hitch them higher, his expression barely changing when Severus slipped another finger in.

He did let his head fall back when Severus began to move the fingers he currently had in him, though, sighing out something that sounded close to, "Severus, please."

"Yes? You had a desire?" Severus kept his hand moving rhythmically, and exchanged smiles with Draco.

"I—can you move faster?" Harry turned his head and opened his eyes, which were bright and filmed at the same time, his tongue sticking out of his mouth now and somewhat interfering with the clarity of his speech. The way that Draco bore down with his arse probably didn't help, either. "I can take it, I promise. I'd let you know if I was in pain."

Severus arched his eyebrows, not entirely believing that with the insane bravery that Harry always thought he needed to have, but nodded and curled his fingers inwards. Harry yelped and jolted back, then forwards, and ended up, poised and trembling, in the middle, as if he didn't know which direction he should go next.

"Are you in pain?" Severus murmured, and kept his voice smooth. Any other emotion now, and Harry might not tell the truth.

Harry grunted, his breath streaming in and out of him for a few seconds as though he was considering whether he should lie. Then he nodded and said, "No, I'm good. _Do _it." And he moved his arse from side to side against the fingers as though Severus might not know what he was talking about.

Severus caught Draco's eye as he moved away and pulled his fingers out of Harry with a sucking sound. Draco's face was bright and shining, so bright that it was hard to put a name to the emotion in it. Solemn, perhaps. Mocking, no. Severus knew that as surely as he knew the second heartbeat outside his body, the one beating in Draco's.

Severus positioned himself close behind Harry, and paused for a moment to take deep breaths and murmur wordlessly to his lovers. He felt a touch on his leg from Draco's foot, and Harry was holding himself steady as a rock now, his breath still in anticipation, not fear. Severus believed that he would have known in a moment if it was fear.

Then he took himself in hand, spread a little more lube along his length for luck, and began to press slowly in.

Harry grunted, once, twice. His head swayed back and forth as though Severus were actually pushing his cock into the back of Harry's neck. Once, his hand flailed out and back as though he would try to stop Severus, but it fell to the bed again, and when Severus stopped and breathed on the nape of his neck, he nodded furiously in invitation to go on.

Severus groaned as he sank in deeper. He had sometimes done so with Draco, but every time, the sound had been wrung out of him involuntarily. This time, the heat around him, the warmth, the heartbeats beneath him and beneath the beneath, made him do it before he thought about it, in tribute to the pleasure there was in being with Draco and Harry like this.

He opened his eyes and looked down, and saw that Draco knew it. He was looking at Severus and smiling, his face no longer so possessed of light. Severus nodded to him in thanks and apology for giving him this second chance, and pulled halfway out.

Harry promptly tossed his head back in protest and moved as if to chase his cock. Severus ran a hand up and then down his side, fingers digging in above the ribs, and Harry shuddered. Severus pushed in once more, forcing Harry down towards Draco, forcing Draco wider open and to lose the smile in a gape and a gasp, forcing himself deeper.

Sharing.

"Now," Severus whispered, and so close was he to the two of them at the moment that it seemed as if one of them might have whispered it and had it be equally his words. He closed his eyes and threw his back into it, as he knew they wished him to do, and let his hands do the seeking, the touching, the telling him what was there.

* * *

Harry felt wrung out, mingled, mixed, left dry.

Helpless.

Caught between them.

He couldn't _concentrate. _Once he had thought that, when he finally had sex, he would remember everything, because it was so intense that it would burn itself into his mind. But here, there were only flashes, and the intensity did indeed burn his mind, but in a different way.

Severus would thrust, and that would jolt him. And Harry would push into Draco, and Draco would arch and push back, not to be outdone, and that would make him feel so good that he was caught on the edge of exquisite pain.

There was sweat dripping into his mouth. Harry flicked his tongue out to catch it and get it out of his way, but it was gone. When had it dried? He didn't know, but Draco was writhing beneath him and making a loud and flattering noise, and Harry kissed him instead, because his mouth was a much more pleasant taste.

Severus was so deep inside him that Harry could feel a foretaste of the pain he would experience tomorrow. But he was also discovering that he _really liked _being fucked, so he didn't mind that part so much.

Draco was straining for his own cock, but Harry was almost flat on top of him from the way they were positioned and the extra weight of Severus on his back, and Draco couldn't sneak a hand in between their bodies to reach it. Harry kissed him again and managed to squirm his wrist down, defeated for a moment by the thick barrier of his own muscles and Draco's abdomen, but—

_There _it was.

Draco closed his eyes and ripped himself to pieces, although the half-ricocheted shaking and the wetness that spread itself over Harry's fingers were the only real signs of it; it seemed that he was too stunned to cry out. Then he opened his eyes, and Harry shivered from the sight of them, from the sight of what _burned _in them.

"You're going to," Draco breathed, their faces close together from Severus's relentless thrusting, hard enough to move the whole bed, or Harry would never have heard him.

"I will," Harry answered, and then there was a _blink _and a _click_ and he lost the next moments to bliss as Severus pushed inside him again.

When he could see past the white clouds that had streamed in front of his eyes, Draco was giving him a coy smile that promptly made Harry's heart beat faster—and not entirely from pleasure. He swallowed and gave Draco what he hoped was a stern glance. Draco only smiled back at him, and then closed his eyes as if to concentrate and squeezed down with his arse.

Harry was lost. He could feel the sensations of bodies from above and below and to the sides, where Draco's legs gripped his hips, and he knew that there was only one way to answer all this pressure, all this glory, all this tightness and holding and refusing to let him escape from them into his own mind—

To come.

So he did.

* * *

Draco shut his eyes when he felt the wetness deep inside him, and then Harry dropped down, unable to support himself anymore, his wet skin rubbing into the come smeared over Draco's belly. Draco stuck out his tongue, and he managed to catch a drop of sweat hanging on the very edge of Harry's nose.

His hand moved steadily, smoothing up and down Harry's back, scraping, gathering sweat, stirring it into the pool that dominated the center of Harry's back. Harry gave a slight, exhausted whimper and tried to stir. Draco held him still, murmuring, caressing, and felt Harry give in as Severus began to thrust and thump, coming closer.

_Coming, _Draco thought, and giggled, because the word had drifted into his mind as though it belonged there but also as though it came from outside, from the mind inside Severus's skull or Harry's, and Draco didn't know what to make of it. He licked Harry's nose again and opened his eyes, seeking Severus over Harry's draped form.

Severus looked back at him, his eyes dark, too, and burning, and his body moving so powerfully that Draco felt his own shuddering in sympathetic reaction, as though he were having another orgasm. Severus reached out a hand, and Draco strained to meet it, his fingers extending until he thought he could feel the flight of the air past them.

Harry reached up between them, with a hand that traveled slowly and paused several times along the way, and Draco's fingers brushed his palm as Severus's fingers brushed the back.

Severus shut his eyes and shuddered, once, a change rolling over his face and through his body. Draco shook again in response, and Harry sighed and murmured that he was trying to sleep.

Severus leaned against Harry's back when he was finished, his eyes shut, his hands dangling on either side of him as if they had grown too heavy for Severus to pick up again. Draco found himself waiting. Severus had often withdrawn from Draco, rather than lying like this, and gone to take a shower. Draco knew that he hated the stickiness, the salt that traveled from one body to another, the lack of cleanliness.

But Severus made no effort to pull away. He murmured something, and then they all three floated into the air and turned over, so that the bed had more than enough room to hold them. Severus might have slipped out of Harry, and might not have; Draco couldn't tell from this angle. All he knew was that there was weight to keep him in place, and warm, without letting him move from his spot.

Astonished, grateful, loving, Draco closed his eyes, and listened to Harry's windy snore in his ear for only a few moments before succumbing himself.

* * *

Shared.

That was the thought Severus had as he lay in the semi-darkness that came from dimming the room's fire, and listened to Harry and Draco breathing. He could tell them apart without thinking; he could tell them apart without hesitating. It was—

This was richness.

This was something Severus had once thought he would never have, and something that he would sacrifice a great deal to keep.

He closed his eyes and lay there, sharing, until sleep came and claimed him, too.


	40. All the Changes

Thank you again for all the reviews! This is the last chapter of _Ashborn, _although I wouldn't be against writing a few short sequels someday. Thank you for reading along!

_Chapter Forty—All The Changes_

"That hammer looks too heavy for me," Harry said, turning his head away and mopping at the sweat on his forehead. He had stood close to the forge for nearly an hour now, watching the way Grass worked, and his eyes burned from the sparks and ached from the contrast between the light of the fire and the dimness that surrounded the rest of the shed. And of course there was the light of the dazzling day through the open door, too, making him blink and sting, blink and snort, and blink and sting some more.

"That's what Lightening Charms are for," Grass said, straightening up and shaking her head. She had sweat running down her face, too, but she didn't look at all discomfited by it when Harry looked at her. "Here, go ahead." She held out the hammer to Harry.

Harry took it gingerly. It was made of polished steel on the head, some dark polished wood he didn't recognize on the handle, and sure enough, it dragged his arm down. Grass snorted and cast a few quick spells, and the hammer almost bobbed in Harry's grasp.

"I heard that you were strong and quick enough to kill a Dark Lord," Grass murmured, leaning back against the wall of the shed and stretching her arms upwards, backwards, down. "Was that an exaggeration? Perhaps you crept up on him when he was sleeping and destroyed him that way."

Harry glared at her, letting his anger soar higher and hotter than he knew he should. But this was a forge, and part of the reason he had come to the werewolves' clearing in the flesh was the argument he'd had with Draco and Severus about his friends the night before, an argument that had left him with a lot of irritation to work out. He was _here _for that reason. He might as well add to his emotions instead of subduing them right away.

"Something more than that," he said coolly, and spun the hammer in his hands. "Let's see you put some metal on the anvil."

"Big words from the wizard who couldn't master a simple Lightening Charm a short time ago," Grass muttered, her smile large and lazy, but she reached into the fire and pulled out a blank of metal that she tossed at him. Harry ducked just in time and watched it settle into place. Of course, her magic had guided it, so it never came close to hitting him. "Let's see you shape that into a sword. You won't, of course, not on your first try, but let's see it anyway."

Harry turned and swung the hammer down furiously at the metal. The red glow challenged him, bit at his temper like the heat and Grass's infuriating competence. It shattered briefly into sparks when he hit it, but remained barely dented, and Harry unleashed as many blows as he could before it cooled, snarling wordless threats at it. This was better than bouncing a Quaffle off the walls of an enclosed courtyard any day.

"I think the only person who could use that sword would be a one-legged dwarf."

Harry looked up, blinking, and found that Grass was standing beside him, examining the sword blank with critical eyes. When he glanced down, he realized that the metal was all crumpled and twisted to one side, much shorter than it should have been compared to the shining blades on the walls of the forge, and cool. He cleared his throat in embarrassment.

"Oh, not to worry." Grass grinned at him. "For your first try, you did much better than I would have expected. And there's an advantage to it, isn't there? For letting out brute physical anger, there's nothing like it."

Harry had to nod. He could barely remember some of the stupid things that Draco had said, or at least he could consider them dispassionately. And remember some of the things _he _had said about Slytherins, too.

"Well." Grass rolled and settled her shoulders. "Good. Do you want to do any more today, or are you returning home?"

"Returning home, I think," Harry said, though he blinked when he realized that he thought of the fortress where the Ashborn had lived for so long as home, rather than the Burrow. Or Hogwarts. But if the time had come for him to return to school, he sure didn't feel it. "Yes. I have things I need to talk to Severus and Draco about."

He braced himself for some reference to other gifts he needed to give the werewolves, or at least Grass and Wind, but she only nodded and turned back to casting spells that would dampen the fire and begin to gather up the metal still waiting to be shaped. Harry wandered out into the light and stood there blinking for a few short moments, then Apparated to the walled garden that he liked to land in.

It was time they talked in more detail, instead of just snorting and storming away.

* * *

Draco settled back on his bed with a sigh and stretched his arms out, closing his eyes. He had spent most of his day hunched over a table in the library, which was the better one for writing, composing a letter back to the Lady Jocelyn. She had written to him with many questions, most particularly about whether he would be keeping up _all _the tenets of the old alliance, and Draco had blatantly stolen much of his best wording from some of the tomes around him. Which also necessitated hunching and squinting at ancient pages.

He had just started to close his eyes when someone knocked on his door, the fist _rat-tatting _in time with Draco's headache. Draco sighed and looked at the door, wishing the someone would go away.

_Someone. _Right. He knew very well it was Harry, and he wouldn't get anywhere by avoiding the conversation that he had tried to have with Harry this morning.

"Come in," he called, looking around the room and summoning a Headache Draught from a shelf of potions when the glance revealed none immediately in reach.

Harry stepped in, shut the door behind him, and stared at Draco with a good deal of apprehension. Draco blinked at him as he uncorked the squat bottle the potion had come in. Harry was flushed and sweaty, apparently having exhausted his anger through physical labor instead of some other way.

"Well," Draco said, when some minutes had passed and Harry hadn't said anything, "did you come to yell or apologize?"

That caused Harry to flush, predictably, and glare at Draco. "I was waiting for you to take the bloody potion," he said, jerking his head at the bottle.

"Fair enough," Draco said, and tilted back the bottle so that the potion in question slid down his throat. It was thick enough that he couldn't swallow right away; he waited until it seemed about to congeal in the back of his throat and then snapped his lips shut and gulped. The headache began to ease off, and he sighed and put the bottle back on the table beside his bed. "But then the question stands."

"Do you know why I got angry?" Harry leaned back more casually against the door now and put his hands in his robe pockets.

"Because I told you that I was going to marry someone else," Draco said, and then thought about the letter he'd received and the second one he'd written and added, "Well, if she even agrees to have me."

Harry blew his fringe sharply out of his eyes and said, "That irritated me, yeah, but it was really what you said about Ron and Hermione."

Draco tilted his head. "What? I said that Weasley would probably understand the notion of an arranged marriage better than you do, because it's something pure-bloods used to do all the time. I don't see what's offensive about that."

"No, not _that_," Harry said, his voice practically picking that particular phrase up with tongs and casting it aside. "When you said that Ron and Hermione's marriage had a lot of the practical and convenient to it, too, instead of the romantic."

Draco blinked. That had been such a fundamental statement of fact that he'd had no idea _how _Harry could object to it. "Well," he said, "it does."

Harry closed his eyes and audibly counted to thirty. Draco was a little disappointed he hadn't tried it in some other language, so Draco could correct his pronunciation.

"It's romantic," Harry said firmly, when he looked at Draco again. "They didn't just get together because-because they spent a lot of time together and because they were friends with me first or anything like that. They got together because they _love _each other."

Draco wanted to open his mouth and say that those things weren't mutually exclusive. Weasley and Granger probably did love each other (though how anyone could love someone like Weasley was a mystery that Draco was still trying to understand with regards to Harry, never mind non-friendship), but they had had the chance to know each other because they shared adventures and trials and dangers together, and certainly their mutual concern about Harry would have given them something else besides their romance to talk about.

But-

_ But maybe I don't need to say absolutely everything I think, _Draco decided slowly. _Harry isn't throwing our past in my face all the time. He isn't telling Severus over and over how horrible he thinks he is for binding the Ashborn, even though I'm sure he _does _think it's horrible. And Weasley and Granger, model romantics as he thinks them, probably don't have every fight they could have because sometimes one of them bites their tongue._

No matter what he might believe about Harry's friends, there was one thing he could say with absolute truth.

"You know them better than I do," he murmured, coming forwards and opening his arms to Harry. "And I'm sorry I upset you. I'll try not to do that in the future."

Harry stared at him, wild and wary, his fringe tangled halfway across his eyes and his hair still slick with sweat. Draco blinked back at him, and wondered at first what the emotion moving through him was. It wasn't desire, something he was now very familiar with when it came to Harry, but it was wilder and gentler and more affectionate.

_I...adore him? Or this is just what romantic love feels like? We can have it without going to bed all the time? _

Draco had no idea why he was asking himself, since it wasn't like he would receive an answer if _he _didn't know or understand the question, but then Harry gave in and wrapped him in a rough hug, and Draco let the moment pass. He put his chin on Harry's shoulder and relaxed.

"It's so strange," Harry murmured, voicing Draco's thoughts, although Draco had no idea whether he had arrived at the conclusion the same way. "I was thinking that we have to share everything we think at all times, but there are subjects I can agree to disagree about with Ron and Hermione. I'll never think that schoolwork is as important as Hermione thinks it is, and Ron thinks the Ministry can be reformed and I don't. It doesn't make us any less friends. I think-I think I could do the same with you and Severus."

Draco smiled against Harry's neck. "Good."

Harry pulled back then, and looked Draco rather sternly in the eye. "Just one thing," he said.

Draco nodded, letting his eyes increase in size as he watched Harry. Harry looked stern and threatening, but also as if he wouldn't mind a bit of playacting. "Yes?"

"You have to be honest with me about things that hurt you," Harry said firmly. "So that we can decide whether they're just something to disagree about, or really, really important things that we need to talk about in detail." He hesitated, and then his hands squeezed Draco's arms and he smiled. "All right?"

"That's easy enough," Draco said, and then laughed when he caught Harry's eye. "No, I know you're probably thinking that _nothing _is easy for me when it comes to honesty, but I can always talk about the pain I'm suffering."

"Well." Harry hesitated again, then gave a temperate smile. "Good." He eyed the letter that Draco still had on the table by his bed. "You're writing to your...bride?"

"Yes," Draco said, not seeing any effort that he should have to make to conceal it. He lifted his eyebrows and waited.

Harry massaged the back of his neck, and frowned. "It just seems weird to me, marrying someone you don't love," he said.

Draco shrugged. "She and I may come to like each other. And she can teach me a lot about the politics of the old alliance, how it was managed and how it functioned somewhere between making exceptions for a lot of personal circumstances and having general rules that reeled everyone in. And she's fascinated by the war. Her family and the few others that still follow the old ways have stayed so thoroughly out of everything that neither the Dark Lord nor your lot ever thought to approach them. The idea of fighting openly is foreign to her."

Harry rolled his eyes. "That's something I would find so foreign in turn that-I don't know if I can live by the rules of this alliance, Draco."

"Then don't," Draco said gently. "Keep the gifts that Laughter's given you, and the promise you made to the centaurs, and leave the other pieces of the alliance, like the merfolk, alone."

"I thought that wasn't possible," Harry said, tipping his head to the side.

"I didn't think it was," Draco admitted. "But that was before I studied those books in intensive detail so I could actually write to Jocelyn. There were plenty of people who had less connection than others to the alliance. Some people might have multiple marriages, lovers, friends on what would have been opposite sides at any other time, allies by special arrangement, enemies they sniped at but wouldn't kill. Others might stick to their blood family or friends they made outside the alliance-Muggles, for example-and maybe be part of one arrangement that they had to be in because it was with the family or the place they lived instead of them as individuals. And that was all."

"I don't see how they survived," Harry whispered. "If everyone had to be part of it-"

"They were, in some way," Draco said. "But they didn't have to be all _equally _a part of it."

Harry still eyed him the way he had a few minutes ago. "I don't know that I'm comfortable with you sleeping with Jocelyn, whoever she turns out to be, whatever she's like," he said. "Even if she would be totally and completely non-jealous of us, that doesn't mean I wouldn't be jealous of her."

"I know," Draco said. "That's why, although at first I talked about conceiving children in the traditional way, I'm writing to her now proposing conception spells. There are ways of making sure that a child has the right father, and stays in the right mother's womb, without either of us touching the other. Close your mouth, dear, you're staring," he added, when Harry's lips parted and didn't close.

"I didn't think anything like that existed, either," Harry said, and scratched his forehead through his fringe, where the lightning bolt scar lay hidden. "The Muggles do, but I'm used to thinking of the wizarding world as backwards compared to the Muggle world."

Draco grimaced. "We lost an awful lot, of both magic and knowledge, when we withdrew into our little private families," he admitted. "There's a certain kind of knowledge that's only secure if lots of people know it and can teach it and it doesn't stay locked inside separate skulls. The Founders of Hogwarts knew that. I've been reading lots of things about them, too, in some of these books. It's fascinating."

He noticed the way Harry started to say something and then hesitated, because he would notice it if Severus did that, too. He was tuned to them in all sorts of ways that he was only now beginning to notice or understand. "What?" Draco added, leaning forwards to stare at Harry.

"I sometimes thought about that," Harry mumbled. "Lying awake in those wretched tents we spent so much time in-or ditches, or cells. How Hermione knew more than I did, and sometimes more than Ron did, but that was because she studied all the time, and she was interested in it for its own sake. And wizarding children are taught at home sometimes before they go to Hogwarts, but their parents might not have the time or the skill to teach them very well. I wonder-I was good at teaching Defense, when we had that bitch Umbridge as a professor and we had to get around her somehow. I'd like to see about teaching other people the kind of knowledge I have..."

"About how to win a war?" Draco asked, and couldn't help grinning when Harry glared at him. "Well. It could be useful knowledge for the next time a Dark Lord tries to take us over, that's certain."

"And more than that," Harry said. "History and small spells and household cleaning charms and spells to preserve food and ways to make things larger or smaller and how you can sharpen your memory and-"

"I think that's a good idea," Draco said firmly. "It would give you something to do that's not just waiting around on us all day."

Harry raised an eyebrow. "Where did you get the idea that I would be waiting around on you?"

"If you're going to hang about here doing nothing but scowling and mumbling, we would put you to use _some_how," Draco said.

The row that followed about that was a good deal friendlier than the one this morning had been, and Harry left the room smiling. Draco let himself sprawl on the bed, reaching his arms out so they touched either side and grinning.

He and Harry were getting to know each other. He wanted to think about that, and was disinclined to continue the letter to Jocelyn for the moment.

* * *

"Severus?"

Severus blinked and looked up. He had been resting with a cup of tea, preparing for the next assault on an Ashborn mind-which meant on his own Legilimency, his own traps to keep something like that from happening. He had not realized someday that he might want to break them, or he would have laid his traps neither deep nor wide.

Harry stood in the door of his lab, framed by the space around him as if he would hurry back down the corridor at a cross word. Severus did not see what he had to fear, frankly. Harry's argument had been more with Draco than with him, this morning. He set down his cup of tea and motioned Harry into the room, clearing away a drift of chopped leaves from the other chair with a flick of his wand.

Harry sat down and spent a few moments tapping his foot on the floor. Then he looked up and said, "Could you teach me Legilimency?"

"Perhaps," Severus said, when enough moments had passed in a shower of invisible sparks to let him conceal his surprise at the question. "It would be different than teaching you Occlumency, at least. Why do you want to learn?"

Harry rubbed the side of his face. "I want to teach people how to survive a war," he said. "Maybe even start a school. But-I have to know what the war did to me, to do that. And I don't think I can face that without knowing more about what's in my mind." He stopped.

"You cannot Legilimize yourself," Severus told him gently. "Not even with a mirror."

Harry grimaced and spent a moment tugging at his hair. Then he said, "Then I'm going to have to ask you a great favor, even bigger than teaching me Legilimency would be, all by itself." He turned to face Severus, visibly bracing for a rejection. Severus narrowed his eyes and said nothing, his hands motionless in his lap. He did not know what Harry would request, and any guesses in anticipation might only push him away and prompt him to do something dangerous and stupid with Legilimency on his own.

"Would you be willing to pick up the threads we dropped, and use Legilimency on me again?" Harry asked quietly. "Teach me how to confront my memories, or bring them to the surface of my mind and-comment on them?"

Severus stared. The thought that Harry might consider his particular acid brand of commentary an asset instead of an insult had never entered his head.

"I _said _it was a huge favor," Harry said hastily, and folded his arms, and looked some combination between disturbed and miserable that, in turn, disturbed Severus. "I understand if you don't want to do it-"

"I did not say I did not want to do it," Severus intervened quietly. "Indeed, the chance to know you better, in this way as much as any, is welcome." He paused.

And Harry read it as a pause rather than simple argument, which showed that he was growing far more attuned to Severus than he had been. He leaned forwards, almost vibrating. "Yes?" he asked intently.

Severus sighed. "I do not think that your memories of the war, and what they did to you, are connected to the war alone. The memories of your childhood, and even your time at Hogwarts, had their part to play, as well. Someone else without your resilience might spend most of his time gibbering in a corner. On the other hand, someone without the relatives that taught you to distrust other people might have survived even better."

Harry's eyes deepened to the color of jade, which Severus had expected. He took any remark like that as a challenge, and it only increased his determination to survive. "That doesn't sound like a refusal."

"It is not," Severus said. "As long as you agree that your memories of the war are not the only ones we need to investigate. As long as I have your permission to touch on others as well, and try to heal the scars that run beneath the surface. _All _of them."

Harry's lips quivered, and then firmed. "I don't-I might not want to face all of them."

Severus shook his head. "I need not comment on all of them in the same way. For that matter, I need not use the same kind of Legilimency to recover them. But I do insist that you learn to face all your demons, not only the ones that you think are necessary. They are so interlinked that if you believe facing some is necessary to open your school, then I think facing all is."

Harry hesitated. Then he said, "If I told you that I just never want to think about the Dursleys again, and that I don't feel any particular malice or hatred towards them, would you accept that as sufficient proof that I'm all right there?"

"On the contrary." Severus leaned back in his chair and eyed Harry. Harry gave him a baffled look, and Severus reminded himself that Harry, unlike Draco, was not familiar with the way he might glance at an experimental potion. "I would find it more reassuring, rather than less, if you were bursting with the desire to destroy them."

Harry ground his teeth. Severus kept his face smooth, but inside, the satisfaction grew thick as a rope. Yes, Harry was angry at _someone. _Severus would take that, if he could take nothing else.

"You don't understand," Harry said, as if speaking to a small child, or Neville Longbottom in a Potions classroom. "I don't want to _think _about them. That's not the same as forgiving them. It's just forgetting about them."

"I will accept neither forgiveness nor forgetfulness in this case," Severus said.

Harry bounced out of the chair and strode forwards to look him in the eyes, reminding Severus unavoidably, with his closeness, that they had shared a bed. "Then you think, you _think_, that I should go and hunt them down to, what, be worthy of your aid?" he spat. His magic coiled in the air in visible rings around him, and Severus heard a scrape at the lab door. He lifted his wand, letting it open so that Shield could fly in. The dragon landed on Harry's shoulder and crooned into his ear, but from the way Harry pushed roughly at his head, Shield had failed to soothe him.

"No," Severus said. "I think that is not possible nor desirable. But forgetting buries them, forgiveness is impossible, and what you need to do is face those memories for _yourself_. So that you can move on with your life and realize your ambitions, some of which you have confessed to me. Not doing that lets your family continue to have power over you."

Harry stopped and stared at him. Then he said, as if willing to discuss the magical theory of someone whose sanity was nevertheless in doubt, "What happens if they stay that way?"

"You do not know yourself," Severus said, leaning forwards and tapping Harry softly in the belly to emphasize his point. He ignored Shield's slight hiss. "You do not get to open this school you've talked of. You do not manage to teach others to survive the war, not when you have not managed to survive your own childhood."

Harry closed his eyes and visibly caught back an angry retort. Severus left his hand in place on Harry's belly, and watched, and waited.

* * *

Harry wanted to protest that of _course _he had survived his childhood, how else did Severus think he was standing here and talking to him right now, and-

_That's not what he means, and you know it._

The more he thought about it, the more Harry had to, reluctantly, acknowledge that Severus was right. His life was a mess, all tangled up together, and he hated the memories of the war but he was more willing to think about them than about the memories of the Dursleys. If everything was fine and he'd actually been in more danger during the war, as he insisted, then that didn't really make any sense.

He wanted to survive, to go on, to live with Draco and Severus, to learn from Grass and Wind, to start a school, to see what keeping his promise to the centaurs entailed, to be with his friends. And who knew? If he didn't face the memories, he might not succeed at any of them. The school part, at least, and continuing to be with Draco and Severus. He wouldn't want to be with lovers who thought he was a danger because of some unexploded bomb in the back of his head.

He met Severus's eyes. "Do you think that Draco needs to sit in on this Legilimency?"

Severus's eyebrows rose, and then he smiled slightly. "Do you insist on sitting in on the brewing sessions that Draco and I conduct?"

Harry wrinkled his nose. "No, because I think they're boring. And because I think that you two need to share things just like all three of us do."

Severus nodded. "Now, I suspect that Draco may have more interest in the results of my reading your memories than you do in potions." He tapped Harry again on the belly, and that made Harry wonder how much weight he had gained. He seemed to be bouncing there, rather. "But if you wish privacy, then do not ask him. He has his alliance and his new bride to occupy him at the moment."

Harry considered Severus. He had been mostly silent during the argument this morning, only speaking up to say that Hermione and Ron were not welcome in the fortress without prior notice of their coming. That had made Harry angry at him at the time, but since then, his rage at Draco had precluded most of that. "Doesn't it bother you?" he asked. "That he's going to marry someone else?"

A weird ripple seemed to travel up Severus's face. Then he shook his head. "It does not, in fact," he said. "Or, at least, not in the same terms it troubles you. I can tell that much from reading your expression, not your mind," he added, although Harry hadn't thought at all of accusing him of using Legilimency.

Harry sighed heavily and flopped back on the chair he'd risen from, pausing so Shield could adjust his weight. "It bothered me when I thought he'd have sex with her," he said. "Now he says that he doesn't need to, in order to conceive children." He cocked his head at Severus. "Did he already tell you that?"

Severus nodded.

"But you still don't seem as bothered as I am." Harry leaned forwards again and touched Severus's arm, looking down at the pale skin and the small black hairs flecked over it. "Why not?"

"I did not expect to survive the war," Severus said, in a low, precise voice that Harry couldn't help thinking he might have used to report to Dumbledore. "Let alone to have lovers. Let alone to have someone marry me."

Harry knew where the courage came from, but not the words, as he met Severus's eyes and said, "I would marry you, if you wanted me to."

Severus blinked for a moment, looking lost. Then he said, "I have thought so little of marriage that I do not even know which kind I would prefer, or if I _wish _to go through it." His hand uncertainly squeezed Harry's, and then dropped back to his side. "I do not know...I would have to think about it."

"Of course," Harry said, and bowed his head. He knew that he was grinning when he lifted it, and Severus stared at him in wary wonder, but then, he couldn't understand the source of Harry's private joy. Harry grinned at him specifically, and gave it to him. "It just seems strange to me that once I vowed to kill you for Dumbledore's murder, and now I'm sitting here and talking to you."

Severus's face grew stiff, and so did his arm under Harry's touch, which was worse than pulling away. "I understand."

Harry sighed, and then reminded himself that things like this were simply going to _happen _with Severus, until he grew more confident and used to being wanted. He rubbed his hand slowly up and down Severus's arm, shaking his head. "No, you don't. I meant that we've _all _changed. Not just you, and not just me, and not just the situation. Hell, I don't think Draco could have borne seeing me touch you just a little while ago."

"And now he cares so little that he is not here."

Harry shook his head. "He's busy, the way you said, but that just gives _us _more time together." And he leaned forwards and kissed Severus, slowly, his hands working deeper into his hair, giving Severus the time to pull away if he wanted to.

It seemed as if he would, from the way his body straightened and his breath hissed out through his nostrils. And his tongue lay still under Harry's, needing several taps and a lot of coaxing to come to life. At last, though, Severus shuddered and relaxed in Harry's grip, his hands rising to close on his shoulders almost desperately.

Harry pulled back and looked into his eyes. "I want to be here," he said. "I want to be with you, with Draco. And find a way to teach people how to survive a war, and get assistance from the members of the alliance if I can. As long as I don't have to pay too high a price for it." He smiled. "And even learn to confront my memories, if you think I should."

"You would trust me that much?" Severus ran Harry's sleeve through his fingers and watched him with narrowed eyes.

Harry nodded. "Because it means trusting you, sure, but also trusting Draco's choices and mine. And I _do_."

Perhaps he had found the right tone at last, perhaps the right words, but Severus relaxed and kissed him of his own initiative this time. Then he pulled back and picked up his wand, aiming it off to the side. "Did you wish to begin our first Legilimency session immediately?"

Harry sat down hard in his chair again, and hesitated a moment. He was feeling good at the moment, trust and triumph trotting through his body. He didn't really want to spoil it with memories of the Dursleys abusing him, or whatever else Severus would find when he went digging around his mind.

On the other hand, he had promised. And he reckoned it was a good sign that he could call what the Dursleys had done to him "abuse."

He swallowed loudly and met Severus's eyes. "If you want to," he whispered. "_Only _if you want to."

"You and Draco relate to each other more with gestures, more with words," Severus answered, his voice only a breath. "This is the best way _I _know to be close to someone. Although it has so often been used for pain in my life, for a twisting of the right way and the best way, I would still like to try it with someone who welcomes me."

And those were the right words for _him_, Harry determined by the wave of relaxation that swept his muscles. He leaned back in the chair and nodded. "All right, then."

This time, the pressure of the spell against the barriers in his mind, the tossing memories that would still keep someone out if he wanted them to, was more like a knock on the door, an invitation. Harry opened it, and let him come in.

* * *

"Sir. Can I talk to you?"

Severus paused in his walk towards the dining hall and turned, staring. It was rare for Incognita to approach or speak to him at all, let alone with that agitation in her voice. He wondered if she had had an argument with Marie Yaxley, whom he had also freed and assumed without much thinking about it would be a companion to Incognita.

But she brushed up to him and took his sleeve without a sign of fear or anger. There was a complex expression on her face, but Severus thought the choleric part of it closer to irritation than anything else.

"It's the merfolk," she said. "I can't reach their minds no matter how much of their language I learn, and there are some concepts that I can only communicate that way. Their language doesn't even have a _word _for alliance with someone who doesn't live in water. I hoped that you could show me some Legilimency that might help."

Severus blinked once, twice, and then decided to treat the request the way it sounded and not as a cover for an attempt to stab him in the back. It would, at the least, be more interesting that way.

"Legilimency on inhuman creatures is dangerous," he said. "It can take some time-perhaps years-to learn the shape of their minds and how it differs from ours."

Incognita swore. That was another sign, Severus supposed when his mind had recovered from the shock, of how much had changed in the way she regarded him. She would never have said such a thing in front of him normally.

"We don't have _years _to establish this part of the alliance," she snapped, leaning back against the wall and combing her fingers through her thick hair. "I've already wanted to attain more than I have now, to show that I'm valuable."

The words touched a chord so deep in Severus that he could not help responding. It was only the form of the response that had changed. Once, it would have been a sneer and a recommendation that Incognita either find a way to touch the minds of the merfolk or some _other _way to make herself valuable.

Now, he said, "I could possibly still help you."

Incognita rolled one eye over to regard him. "How, if you can't teach me Legilimency that will reach them?"

"Someone who already has the training has a better chance of success," Severus said quietly, meeting her eyes. "And someone who is both an Occlumens and a Legilimens stands the best chance of all, for he can shelter his mind from the alien influences that might otherwise poison it."

Incognita hesitated for so long that Severus thought she might not have taken his completely transparent meaning. Then she stood up and swallowed. "You're volunteering to be the one who contacts the merfolk," she said.

Severus inclined his head, and said nothing.

"_Why_?" Incognita had her hands braced on her knees now, as though she was going to bolt away, but wanted to give Severus a chance to speak first.

"Because it is something I have not done before," Severus said. "Because it is a task that is worthy of someone who is both Legilimens and Occlumens, and thought he would never get a chance to exercise those talents both at once again." He had the trust Harry had reposed in him, of course, and thinking of the memories he had seen that day made him want to smile, but that was not the sort of thing he would share with Incognita. "Because it would give me a part in the alliance, which at the moment I have mostly stood aside from."

"It might also give you obligations that you wouldn't want to have."

Incognita's eyes seemed to glow with a strange meaning as she stared at him, and Severus finally grasped what she was saying. She knew his mind as only someone who had lived under his binding could have. She didn't see any reason why the man who had enslaved her would want to oblige himself to someone else.

"I do not intend to accept any obligations that I do not want," Severus said coolly. "I have learned the pleasure of making my own decisions, and will not yield that to someone else."

Incognita took a step nearer, and her eyes had a flame burning at the bottom of them that looked as if it might explode outwards and shower him with sharp sparks. "And yet, you are someone who conspired to take others' freedom of choice away from them," she whispered.

"I did that in the past," Severus said, his eyes not moving from Incognita's face. His hand was ready on his wand should he need it, but he did not think he would. "I have changed now. And no one could have _forced _me to change if I did not want to. Certainly the ones I took the freedom from could not have, as their will was gone."

Incognita was still for a moment, biting her lip. Then she said, "I am not sure that freedom earned in that way is a guarantee that you will never do it again."

Severus shook his head. "You are questioning how your freedom was earned? Rather than using it?"

"I am not the same woman I was, either," Incognita said, but from the sound of it, she had calmed down. She moved a few steps back, cocking her head as if to study him. "I might question. But it is true that I care more about what I can do with that freedom, and that I have it in the first place, than the motives of the one who gave it to me. I wish only to be clear that there is no debt between us."

"No debt," Severus said. "I would owe you one, perhaps, but since we wish to have nothing more to do with each other..."

"No," Incognita said. "Not _nothing_. You will help me with the alliance, I hope? You will contact the minds of the merfolk, as the only one with the gifts that will permit you to do it?"

"Ah, then," Severus said, permitting himself to smile. "Then we will begin a new circle of debts, alliances, and obligations. But we will ignore the past, and not allow it to intrude on the future. Is that the way you wish to phrase it?"

Incognita thought about it, her lips so firmly pursed that Severus thought for a moment she would refuse after all. Then she nodded and put her hand out. "Shake on it?" she asked, not having missed Severus's backwards flinch at the mere thought of touching another person.

Severus hesitated one more moment, giving himself, more than her, the ability to back out if he wanted to. But he found that he did not want to, that he was curious as to what would happen if he did this thing.

His hand touched hers, and the next moment Incognita had pulled away and was leading him briskly down the corridor, speaking over her shoulder. "Part of the trouble is that they think of themselves as the only political beings in the world. The colony in the Hogwarts lake has been isolated for so long that they don't even believe in other merfolk. And their minds are hard for me to understand in the first place, and I've learned Mermish by magic, and dreaming myself into their lake with all the charms that will allow me to survive in place is tedious in the _extreme..._"

Severus followed her, wondering, as he went, what it would be like to speak with creatures who had no cultural prohibition against Legilimency, or at least, as they would have to, different ones than ordinary humans.

He could feel his interest stirring to life in the back of his mind.

* * *

"And what finally happened with Malfoy and this woman that he was going to marry?"

Harry waved a lazy hand, leaning back on the grass outside the Burrow and closing his eyes. The sunlight was warm on his face, and the clouds were coming to steal it away soon. He didn't think he wanted to talk about Draco and the politics of the alliance right now.

But Hermione was insistent, poking him in the back and sides until Harry sighed and sat up again. "She said that she was going to need more reassurances, and that she wanted to see him face-to-face so she could make sure she wasn't going to have ugly children," he said.

Hermione tried to stifle a smile while Ron shrieked in laughter. "Bet the little git hated _that_," he chuckled.

Harry shot Ron a look over the name, but he couldn't really disagree about the sentiment. Draco had stared at the letter for an awfully long time, shaking his head as though he couldn't believe Lady Jocelyn's extraordinary conduct. "Yes," he admitted. "He wrote her back indignantly, and I don't know if their marriage is going to come off after all. Or she might propose a simple child-contract instead of a marriage."

"You don't sound that upset about it," Hermione said, studying him.

Harry smiled at her. "Do you mean that I'm not upset about Draco getting married, or not upset about him not getting married? Because both are true."

"I never pictured you that way, that's all," Hermione said quietly. "You told me once that the first thing you were going to do after the war was propose to Ginny, and then you'd settle down and have a perfectly normal life."

Harry flopped back on the grass again and watched the light edging around one huge cloud. "Do you remember _when _I told you that?" he asked.

Hermione hesitated a moment, but then she said, "Of course. The first month after we started hunting the locket Horcrux, when we thought we would manage to finish everything up in a year at the most."

Harry nodded. "I did think that was what I wanted then. I was just separated from Ginny, and I missed her like mad. And I still like her," he added hastily, because of the way Ron was looking at him. "A lot. Just not enough to marry her."

"Your desires changed," Hermione said.

Harry turned his head and blinked at her, wondering if it would be that easy after all, to make her understand his meaning, without screaming and yelling at her. Maybe so. In the end, she was his friend, not his enemy, even if they disagreed so much sometimes that it seemed that way.

"Yes," he said. "I didn't know what I wanted. Now I want to study, and I want privacy, and I want love, and I might want to get married. Someday, they'll all settle down and make sense. At the moment, things are tangled and chaotic, and that's the way it is."

Ron grunted a little. Then he said, "You should know, mate, that Dad finally talked to Percy. He claims that he didn't deliberately tell anyone enough to let them figure out your weaknesses."

He seemed to have finished. Harry waited a few minutes, and then said, "Well. That's good. Of course, they could have picked it up from him in some other way, but if it's not deliberate treachery, then I can still talk to him without wanting to kill him. Tell him that, will you?"

Ron hunched his shoulders. Then he whispered, "I don't know if I can, Harry. Even if he didn't betray you on purpose, the fact that he didn't see anything wrong with going on to work for them after the attack-"

"I don't think we're ever going to understand everything about that attack," Harry interrupted quietly. "The body we found floating in the water had been altered by magic, no doubt of that, and so it must have come from the attack. But the Ministry refused to claim it, and they're probably not going to say anything about it to us, not when they finally have a treaty with us. And you know that your father still works for the Ministry, too, and you're going to, if you become an Auror. You don't need to talk like that."

Ron gave him a sharp look. "Then you don't really care that it was probably Percy's information that let them attack you?"

Harry shook his head. "I care, but I can't prove it. I would rather-let bygones be bygones, where I can. The future is going to be crowded enough as it is." He shivered, thinking about the memories that Severus had called up for him to face that morning. Harry had wanted to rage through Severus's lab afterwards the way he had through Dumbledore's office after he found out about the prophecy. Luckily, Severus had acted quickly to restrain him. "And frightening."

"What are they making you do now?" Hermione leaned forwards as if intensely interested in the answer.

Harry rolled his eyes at her. "Only the things I told you about. And no one made me do it. This is what I _want_."

"I don't know if your desire is always a good guide in cases like this," Hermione said, her voice deep and sad.

Harry didn't snap back at her, because that would only lead to another tedious argument where she pretended not to understand why he was upset and he tried to reassure her about things that only time could convince her of. She would become less and less afraid of Draco and Severus breaking his heart the longer it didn't happen, Harry reckoned. He only looked up at the clouds and the sunlight and thought for a few minutes before he answered.

"Maybe not. But I haven't seen any really bad consequences from it yet. I'll let it happen for now, and if necessary, I can change my mind. And at least experimenting like this will teach me what I _really _want."

Hermione was silent, which either meant she was answered or she had let it go. Harry shut his eyes and drifted away into the space of time woven by the sunlight and the smell of the grass and the rumble of distant thunder.

* * *

"I still can't believe that she refused _me!"_

A quiver at the corner of Harry's lips told Draco that Harry didn't agree. He leaned forwards with his eyes narrowed. "I suppose that you think she could do a lot better with someone else?"

"I don't know anything about the other people who might have proposed marriage to her," Harry said temperately, holding one hand up. Shield, seated on his shoulder, followed the motion with his eyes, and then seemed to decide there was nothing to fear. "But, Draco, think about it. Someone she doesn't know writes to her and tells her that he wants to marry her, or at least set up a child-contract, and tells her that he read about her family and the way they live out of _books_. Would you trust a Muggle who tried to contact you that way?"

"No Muggle knows how to handle an owl," Draco muttered, and rolled away so that his hand trailed in the stream. They were outside, the way that Harry seemed to prefer to be when the weather was nice, and even Severus had been coaxed to come with them. He had a book in front of him, his lips moving, but now and then he shut his eyes and moved his lips that way instead. Draco knew he was looking up information on the ways of reading merfolk minds and might not be listening to the conversation.

It was nice to have him here, even so.

"But think about it, if they did," Harry said relentlessly. "If they were a Muggle with a Muggleborn family member, perhaps. Would you consider yourself bound to seriously think about their offer just because they appeared out of nowhere and they'd like you to?"

Draco grunted, and then sighed. Harry's way of thinking about it was actually better than deciding that he just hadn't been acceptable to Jocelyn, in and of himself. "No."

"Well, then." Harry turned his head sharply as a ripple in the water started mounding up-those instincts from the war that he would probably never entirely lose-but still continued speaking to Draco. "It's probable that _she _didn't feel that way, either."

Draco shut his eyes and tried to see it from the perspective that Harry insisted was Jocelyn's. Well, maybe. Maybe he could think of it like that, yes, as long as he didn't let it destroy his self-confidence.

Harry hissed something in Parseltongue.

Draco let his eyes pop open and his hand fall on his wand. Harry was standing to greet that bloody snake with the long, horse-like head and shining blue eyes. Corners, that was what he called himself. He reared up in the water and dipped his head down towards Harry, his eyes with their absurd lashes opening and closing. Shield had taken off and flew around the serpent's head, hiss-crooning.

Harry asked something in Parseltongue, or Draco thought it was a question from his inflection of the words. Corners hissed something back, and Harry laughed. "I should have known," he said in English, turning towards Draco and Severus.

"Known what?" Severus had put the book down and was paying close attention to this portion of the conversation, at least. But his hands were mounded smoothly in his lap over the book, and he didn't appear as if he would curse Corners. Draco dropped the only worry he'd had and tried to smile at the beast. Of course, no answering smile appeared on the equine face.

"Corners left for a while," Harry explained, careful to keep his face turned to the side so that he wouldn't start speaking in the snake-language again. "He kept thinking about the Ministry raid, and the part he'd played in it. He didn't like that glimpse of war. His kind don't have conflicts like that. Just struggles between individual Water People."

"He decided to forgive us, then?" Severus wore the same look that Draco suspected he himself did, eyes slightly narrowed and voice gone emotionless.

Harry just rolled his eyes at them and reached up to lay his hand along the side of that slender, flowing neck. Corners looped his head around without effort to enclose Harry's hand in himself. Harry hissed a long, complicated series of fluting sibilants, and Corners responded with what sounded like the noise from a teakettle, ignoring Shield as he landed on Harry's shoulder again and tried to add something. Draco wondered idly if one could learn Parseltongue by listening to sounds like that.

"To him, there's not much to forgive," Harry said. "Only what he likes and doesn't like. He didn't know if he liked humans. He did decide to give us another chance. But the stories he told the Water People didn't tempt any of them to come back with him. This time," he added.

Severus nodded, and returned to his book. Corners flowed out of the river and coiled himself into the cup that Harry hastily conjured. Harry sat down and started talking to him, ignoring the way Draco stared and sometimes even asked for translations into English.

"Translations in a minute," he finally snapped. "I have an awful lot to ask him."

Draco took a deep breath and made himself relax the muscles in his arms and shoulders one by one. He finally leaned back on the grass and shut his eyes.

And heard the murmuring of Harry to the snake, and the whispers of Severus to himself, and the gurgling of the river.

And then the cautious stamping of hooves.

Opening his eyes, Draco watched as the centaurs left their garden and came down to the river to drink. Kleianthe led the way, her arms folded sternly, while her daughter hid behind her flank and Thera's kept close to her mother, in turn. Thera smiled at them all and then folded her knees to get her mouth near the water.

Draco wondered for a moment what his parents would say if they could see him like that, on the grass beside two lovers, smarting from the sting of a woman he had proposed a child-contract to, listening to Parseltongue, watching the motions of a herd of magical creatures whom they would not have considered worthy to be his allies.

And he would never know, because they were dead.

But he could still live. He could imagine what they would have said, and value it, or discard it, and no one could stop him, because he was still alive.

Draco reached out a hand and touched Harry on one side and Severus on the other. Severus took it, entwining his long, pale fingers with Draco's. Corners hissed something, and Harry laughed and seized Draco's other hand, swinging it, glancing at him with green eyes that shone.

Draco lay back again, and let happiness rise up in him in answer to that which rained down on him from above and all around.

**The End.**


End file.
